Comp. 3353 invited poems about ‘dining and dashing’ – thanks to Paul Freeman for the suggestion. There was a very large postbag/inbox full of delicious offerings and I am especially sorry not to have had room for W.J. Webster condemning the crime for its name alone: ‘it isn’t just pedantic/ To say its source is transatlantic’. Josephine Boyle deserves a mention for her payoff: ‘But all deceptions have a price:/I can’t eat anywhere good twice.’ The winners get £25 (a paid-for pub lunch for one?) each.
On honeymoon, in a greasy spoon
Where we contrived to fetch up,
The tea was sweet, but our feet were fleet –
We left only a smudge of ketchup –
When they bring the menu, that is when you
Plan in which course to exit:
We’re the Bonnie and Clyde of The Good Pub Guide
When the waiter least expects it.
A thorough trough, and we’re up and off
With our credit cards still intacta
We’re adrenaline junkies who love a bunk –
Though the moolah’s an added factor.
At The Fat Duck, Bray, we got clean away –
Well, Heston doesn’t need the dosh –
With the money saved, we’ll get what we’ve craved:
Posh nosh at Le Gavroche.
Bill Greenwell
In days when Vikings plagued our shores
With longship, fire and sword,
They’d celebrate their victories
And feast as their reward.
They’d dine for free on choicest meat,
And have their fill of ale,
Then satisfied with spoils and food
They’d leave, and northwards sail.
In imitation of such deeds
Some folk go out to dine
And they select the dearest food
And drink the finest wine;
Like hordes of Vikings they are pleased
To eat, then dash away,
For like the raiders of the past
They see no need to pay.
Frank McDonald
We swank in via the maitre d’
Our pockets clean of cash,
Then gorge ourselves outrageously
And bolt out past the trash.
Proprietors think us obscene
For having had our fill
Of lobster bisque or lamb tagine
But not footing the bill.
Yet food unpaid for is more sweet
Than any that we’ve bought,
And belting out into the street
We celebrate, uncaught.
Adrenaline’s our secret sauce,
We pipe it on with glee,
Adding a zest to every course:
Pure criminality.
Adrian Fry
The waiter came. The Walrus smiled
And ordered Armagnac.
He whispered to the Carpenter:
‘We’ll have a little slack
While he pours that, so do get set
To leg it out the back.’
The waiter went. The Walrus rushed,
The Carpenter behind,
Out through the back into the street.
The waiter did not mind:
‘Those two are on CCTV –
They won’t be hard to find.’
David Blakey
Had we but world enough and cash,
We wouldn’t need to dine and dash,
We’d settle down and eat our fill
And then we’d even pay the bill.
But we live in a straitened time,
Restaurant prices are a crime,
And since fishfingers are the pits
Let’s go and dine out at the Ritz,
And when we’ve had the petits fours
We’ll nip out by the fire door.
But ever at my back I hear
The sound of sirens drawing near,
And soon we’ll have to try the grub
In Holloway and Wormwood Scrubs,
So till we’re featured in The Sun
We’ll wine and dine, and then we’ll run.
Brian Murdoch
Wake! For the cat who hunted with the owl
For reckless rodent and benighted fowl
Now sings of inanition and assaults
My bedroom window with its horrid howl.
Before the last sweet dream of night had died,
Methought a voice before the cottage cried,
‘When there is great sufficiency within,
Why leave a needy cat to cry outside?’
I dish the Whiskas, setting it before
The surly beggar singing at the door
Knowing how little time it has to stay
And, once departed, may return no more.
The roving ginger eats, and having ate
Moves on and no suggested benefit
Can lure it back to snuggle or recline,
Nor even bleach wash out the whiff of it.
Ann Drysdale
Our cover story: it’s a birthday, say.
We’re pushing out the boat! Such clichés make
the maitre d’ less circumspect, let him display
his innate snootiness. That way he’ll take
us for a pair of plonkers. Champagne? – yes,
why not? Lobster (for both), a side of chips –
oh watch his face, that struggle to express
attentiveness but never curl his lips! –
and Meursault. Steaks (your largest); then Margaux,
the ’95. We’re customers: the bill
will be enormous (and his tip) and so
he’ll never question how we get our thrill.
We’ve honed our skills: dine, dash. A simple plan
and why? Because we can! We bloody can!
D.A. Prince
No. 3356: Hearing things
You are invited to imagine a conversation taking place between some usually inanimate objects (16 lines/150 words maximum). Please email entries to competition@spectator.co.uk by midday on 26 June.
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