Not Love

Today so many food-words bargained for:

 

sausages or broccoli,

chocolate or cauliflower,

chips, peas,

brown or white,

marmalade or marmite,

apple or ice cream,

banana, egg, maltesers?

 

I got home, exhausted by negotiation,

looked again at your sticky mouth, lips,

another wipe and another bite to eat

and more to clean and toilet out.

All challenged,

every mouthful for debate

 

and then I saw it!

That it’s not about Love,

your lesson today.

Not Love. Love is a portal, gate

with more to get – beyond the word;

to bend my unbent leg,

doff cap,

drop knees.

 

Central to every comedy,

tragedy or history

(Macbeth and Basil Fawlty):

hard to admit and even

further out than love

and harder than love to say,

to learn about,

the word that came to me,

a funny word,

softly,

with surprise,

well wrapped:

Humility.