Epigram
by George Held
Poets have been mysteriously silent on the subject of cheese. G.K. Chesterton
How I love to cut the fromage,
The riper the better
Odors fragrant as a corsage
Make the mouth water.
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On the subject of cheese.
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{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }
George,
Your bite-size poem was delicious. I used this Chesterton chestnut in a poem, “Listening to Cheese.” Poetic note: Donald Hall some time back corrected our collective shortcoming. See “O Cheese” included in White Apples and the Taste of Stone, Selected Poems 1946-2006.
Amicus poeticae,
Neal Whitman
Thanks, Neil, for your kind words and your references to recent cheese poems. I suspect Chesterton was being wry rather than literal and knew that Shakespeare, among others, commonly mentioned cheese, as when Falstaff praises “cheese and garlic,” though in prose (1 Henry IV). Could Hall be the first poet to fill the cheese void?
George,
Wonderful epigram. Remember you cholesterol medication.
. . . And always followed by my Lipitor.
You write of cheese with ease.
I feel I must reply.
Keep up the humor, please.
Just make mine ham on wry.
Chesterton has clearly not heard my poem, Cheese Teacher. Indeed there seems to be a few cheese poems out there. Maybe we can have a cheesey volume. There’s a project.
Hang on! You say you like to cut the fromage. Do you mean you like to cut the cheese? Metaphorically? That opens a whole new world of possibilities.
Barb, there! Just went back to check out the new web design and found your comment left two weeks ago. YOU are what I love about GSR and online journals. Immediacy! What a dill. Your wit is superb. Hope to see you return and return.
Amicus poeticae,
Neal Whitman