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Friday 10 November 2006 | someone left a cookie

VINDALOO IN MERTHYR TYDFIL

The first night of my second voyage to Wales,
tired as rag from ascending the left cheek of Earth,
I nevertheless went to Merthyr in good company
and warm in neckclothing and speech in the Butcher’s Arms
till Time struck us pintless, and Eddie Rees steamed in brick lanes
and under the dark of the White Tip we repaired shouting

to I think the Bengal. I called for curry, the hottest,
vain of my nation, proud of my hard mouth from childhood,
the kindly brown waiter wringing the hands of dissuasion
O vindaloo, sir! You sure you want vindaloo, sir?
But I cried Yes please, being too far in to go back,
the bright bells of Rhymney moreover sang in my brains.

Fair play, it was frightful. I spooned the chicken of Hell
in a sauce of rich yellow brimstone. The valley boys with me
tasting it, croaked to white Jesus. And only pride drove me,
forkful by forkful, observed by hot mangosteen eyes,
by all the carnivorous castes and gurus from Cardiff
my brilliant tears washing the unbelief of the Welsh.

Oh it was a ride on Watneys plunging red barrel
through all the burning ghats of most carnal ambition
and never again will I want such illumination
for three days on end concerning my own mortal coil
but I signed my plate in the end with a licked knife and fork
and green-and-gold spotted, I sang for my pains like the free
before I passed out among all the stars of Cilfynydd.

—Les Murray

someone left a cookie

  1. mandarin said on Monday 13 Nov 2006 at 8.16 am:

    Tired as rag ascending the left cheek of Earth. Me too. But I will just go back to the comparatively sad markets of Salamanca in pursuit of Greek yogurt. (Oh Rainbow Cooperative Grocery! Oh, dare I say it, Whole Foods! Oh kombucha!) (But it is only two and half months, and this time, I have a top sheet!) No soul-saving, mucous-membrane scouring for me. I’m saving myself for the tear-inducing pleasures of a tablespoon or three of San Francisco’s wasabi.
    And GODDAMN you kick GRE tokhes. Many happy returns of the day.


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