Classic Poem

T ORANIUS come and dine (or fast) with me,
If you should find your lonely table bore you;
Have you a jaded palate? there shall be
No lack of leeks or lettuce to restore you;
Sliced tunny with its egg — fresh broccoli
On a black plate my slave shall set before you,
This from my garden cool — but touch it not
With careless fingers, 'twill be piping hot.

A sausage on polenta snowy white,
Plump lentils duly flanked with streaky bacon;
Then if dessert can stir your appetite,
Raisins and Syrian pears shall next be taken,
Chestnuts from learned Naples, cooked aright
In slowest heat their savour to awaken,
And from my humble wine-jar do not shrink,
The better seems the wine the more you drink.

And then, these dainties done, if Bacchus please
To stir new craving, I can satisfy it
With fine, fat olives from Picenum's trees,
Or lupins, or parched peas. I don't deny it
Is a poor dinner; yet to lie at ease
Nor need to hear small gossip, or supply it,
Is something gained: and here you need not wear
The jaded diner's artificial air.

I'll read no heavy tome when dinner's done,
Nor strive by any dancer's aid to quell you,
Those Spanish jades are minxes, every one,
Their artful attitudes would but repel you,
" But Condylus shall pipe — and there is none
More skilled than he — perhaps I ought to tell you
That you'll sit next the lady you adore.
Whom shall we ask to make a cosy four?