Werbunfulchen

Werbunfulchen

Your face lit a little as you jawed about your girlfriend,
that light an inadequate bulb, a half-lost memory,
a badly-acted scene of happiness with a lover,
a lover, a lover.

Her name was Werbunfulchen, pronounced Germanically.
I wanted to know what you liked about her
- also what she looked like (of course).
Was she slimmer, younger, prettier than I am?
I didn't wonder about her name, though what kind of name,
is Werbunfulchen?

You didn't say much about her as we lay on sunlit grass
together, together, together, but you left after twenty minutes
and then I had a lot of aching to do, without you, without you.

Shall we unpick it?
'Wer' - she's a were-creature, like a werewolf.
'Chen' at the end means 'little'.
In between in 'bunful' - such a lovely thing to be!
Full of spherical carbohydrate, well-endowed with buns.
Buns in all the ovens and fluffy bunny rabbits.
Except that the little bun woman is a were-creature.
Beware! She's bad for you! Love me instead.

Though at the time I didn't care about her name.
I just loved that twenty minutes lying on sunlit grass
with you, with you, with you.
With the nonsense-importance of dreams,
I didn't care about language at all. Imagine!
I just cared about you.