Sunday 14 December 2014

Garden of gluttony by Manuel Kneepkens


Garden of gluttony

On cool summer nights when the family noisily dispatched
raw herring, followed by asparagus with butter sauce
steak, salad, chips, and as desert
strawberries, cream, mocha and custard

then they heaved, the aunts, like peonies, or gaseous balloons
on sticks, on the swell of their giggling
in all  their tender bosoms Wagner cooed audibly

they drank wine after wine
until every head looked like pope pius XII in the Holy Year
so pale!

then finally uncle after uncle, blind drunk, bade farewell
and every aunt's creamy backside rocked away
only the night remained, that very old lady
that peacock-blue fan before the lonely smile
of the universe
god of the butterflies, then you slept!
the windows open, costly dreams fell prey


(Original title: 'Tuin van eetlust' - From: 'Tuin van eetlust', 1976 - Uitgeverij De Bezige Bij, Amsterdam)
Manuel Kneepkens [1942]


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