Nor show a blindworm how to blink,

Nor teach an old racoon Chinese.

The juiciest orange feels the squeeze;

Who spends his portion will be broke;

Who has no milk can make no cheese –

So say I and so say the folk.

He makes no blot who has no ink,

Nor gathers honey who keeps no bees.

The ship that does not float will sink;

Who’d travel far must cross the seas.

Lone wolves are seldom seen in threes;

A conker ne’er becomes an oak;

Rome wasn’t built by chimpanzees –

So say I and so say the folk.

Envoi

Dear friends! If adages like these

Should seem banal, or just a joke,

Remember fish don’t grow on trees –

So say I and so say the folk.

Advertisement

The lady takes The Times and Vogue,

Wears Dior dresses, Gucci shoes,

Puts fresh-cut flowers round her room

And lots of carrots in her stews.

A moss-green Volvo, morning walks,

And holidays in Guadeloupe;

Long winter evenings by the fire

With Proust and cream of carrot soup.

Raw carrots on a summer lawn,

Champagne, a Gioconda smile;

Glazed carrots in a silver dish

For Sunday lunch. They call it style.

Lonely Hearts

Can someone make my simple wish come true?

Male biker seeks female for touring fun.

Do you live in North London? Is it you?

Gay vegetarian whose friends are few,

I’m into music, Shakespeare and the sun.

Can someone make my simple wish come true?

Executive in search of something new –

Perhaps bisexual woman, arty, young.

Do you live in North London? Is it you?

Successful, straight and solvent? I am too –

Attractive Jewish lady with a son.

Can someone make my simple wish come true?

I’m Libran, inexperienced and blue –

Need slim non-smoker, under twenty-one.

Do you live in North London? Is it you?

Please write (with photo) to Box 152.

Who knows where it may lead once we’ve begun?

Can someone make my simple wish come true?

Do you live in North London? Is it you?

On Finding an Old Photograph

Yalding, 1912. My father

in an apple orchard, sunlight

patching his stylish bags;

three women dressed in soft,

white blouses, skirts that brush the grass;

a child with curly hair.

If they were strangers

it would calm me – half-drugged

by the atmosphere – but it does more –

eases a burden

made of all his sadness

and the things I didn’t give him.

There he is, happy, and I am unborn.

Tich Miller

Tich Miller wore glasses

with elastoplast-pink frames

and had one foot three sizes larger than the other.

When they picked teams for outdoor games

she and I were always the last two

left standing by the wire-mesh fence.

We avoided one another’s eyes,

stooping, perhaps, to re-tie a shoelace,

or affecting interest in the flight

of some fortunate bird, and pretended

not to hear the urgent conference:

‘Have Tubby!’ ‘No, no, have Tich!’

Usually they chose me, the lesser dud,