Frank McDonald/Elizabeth Barrett Browning ‘How do you like your eggs?’ the waiter says And with a smile Elizabeth replies: ‘How do I like them? Let me count the ways: I like them scrambled, sometimes served with fries; Or smiling at me like a golden sun Inviting me to spill delicious yolk; Or boiled hard as when in Easter fun I used to roll them, like religious folk.’ I touch her hand and say: ‘Let’s take them fried’. And with a gentle giggle she agrees. The waiter stands and watches, mystified, As though she had been speaking Portuguese. She turns and says, as he regards her, frowning, ‘We’ll have some toast — with just a hint of browning.’
Chris O’Carroll/Emily Dickinson ‘I’m Nobody’, her wan Voice breathes As we sit down to Tea. ‘I taste in every — Crumb — a faint — Yet full Sufficiency.’
Her Flask pours out a golden Dram. ‘This is no — earthly Wine,’ She murmurs, ‘but for Souls — that thirst ’Tis sovereign Anodyne.’
She cuts a Slice of Cake to fit A frugal Appetite. ‘Repleteness’, she explains, ‘for me Were but infirm — Delight.’
With every Bite or Sip we share, A Century expires. No Timepiece can surmise the Span Our Nourishment requires.
Bill Greenwell/John Betjeman After a beach-walk, so bracing and brisk, Home to the kippers, the bangers, the jam – Fresh eggs to be scrambled, oh! hand me the whisk! Let me frisk up the yolks! Let me plate up the ham!
There is bread to be toasted, and butter to spread, As the sunlight pours in as if warm from the churn, And here is my girl who has bounded from bed: See her muscular fingers agog at the urn!
The bacon is sizzling, the corn flakes are shaken, The newspapers rustle with yesterday’s scores, Out on the front all the loungers are taken, But my darling and I are as happy indoors!
Sir John doffs his boater, and scoffs up a bloater, With avuncular noise, but a gleam in his eye: And now he has asked me for use of my motor, And now I must wave him and Mabel goodbye.
George Coppersmith/John Milton Of pub lunch with that great blind Puritan, Who droneth grace at weary length while ale, Bread, cheese and Branston pickle wait to be Consumed, and I my growling stomach hear Make loud complaint against a piety That thus God’s wholesome sustenance postpones As if these viands set before us were Forbidden fruit that might our souls ensnare, Sing heavenly muse, that I my argument Against such drawn-out prayer may expound And justify an urgent appetite. ’Tis always meet to give God thanks and praise, But brevity is not ingratitude, Nor do elaborate words and cadences The Giver of these gifts best glorify. They also serve who eat what’s on the plate.
Alan Millard/Lewis Carroll ‘Will you eat a little faster?’ said the reverend to me, ‘We’ve finished all the jewfish and there’s plenty more for tea, By swallowing so slowly you will never feel replete. Oh will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you hurry up and eat?
There’s mackerel mince and battered brill and cockle-curried bream And haddock mixed with halibut and humpback salmon cream, There’s marinated mussel-meat that truly tastes a treat, Oh will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you hurry up and eat?’
You’ve hardly touched a morsel and with little time to waste Before we sit for supper I suggest you gather haste, I’ve said it more than once, I know, and yet I must repeat, Oh will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you hurry up and eat?’
Said I, ‘I thank you, reverend sir, but surely you’ll agree So many fishy dishes are a lot to eat for tea.’ ‘Not so,’ said he, ‘to eat a feast is not so great a feat, So will you, won’t you, will you, won’t you hurry up and eat?’
Brian Murdoch/Chaucer Whan that we came to Becket’s shrine atte laste, Quoth I, ‘Dan Chaucer, let us break oure faste.’ The Wife of Bath, the Miller and the Reeve Did for the lowest drinking-house soon leave, But we into the city streetes did go To feaste with the good Monsignor Nando. ‘Yea,’ said Dan Chaucer, with a goodly cheere, ‘I would eat half a roasted Chantecleere And eke half of that damn’d Dame Pertelot, With sauce, peri peri yclept, al hot, With rootes from Hy Brasil come newe, Seethed better than that thirde-rate Cooke could do And drinke wine, so that forget I might That by-oure-lady Prioresse, that Knight, And this riche fare shall rid me at the leaste Of that verbose, meddlesome Nonne’s Preest!’
Not all the errant children in Hilaire Belloc’s Cautionary Tales met a grisly end. Your next challenge is to submit an update on one of the characters — Lord Lundy? Godolphin Horne? Franklin Hyde — who didn’t die. Please email entries of up to 16 lines to lucy@spectator.co.uk by midday on 13 May.
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