"Pick your favourite poet or poem and write something eggy in the style of said poet/poem" so says Jeanne from Cooksister. I am a closet poetry fan. I love reading it and writing it and I have many favourites. None moreso, perhaps, than Andrew Marvell's To His Coy Mistress. It is the perfect example of the lengths a 17th Century Puritan gentleman might go to, to get into a lady's knickers. If someone had written me such a brilliant and romantic poem, I am sure I would have surrendered immediately. Who knew they were so hot and sexy back in the olden days?? I suppose I don't really to his verse justice by turning Marvell's masterpiece into an ode to an egg on toast, so please forgive me in advance. It was fun writing it, but maybe not quite as much fun as being the object of Marvell's affections might have been.
Had we but no blog and time
Fine cooking, readers, were no crime
We would sit down and think which way
To cook our eggs and take all day
My vegetable love should grow
Frittata-like and oh so slow
An hundred years should go to praise
Thine yolk, and on they pure white gaze
For egg you deserve this state
Nor would I love at lower rate
But at my back I always hear
Time's sell-by-date hurrying near
And yonder all before us lie
Deserts of vast eternity
Thy beauty shall no more be found
In broken shell, upon the ground
Your untouched fruit would turn to dust
And into ashes, my famished lust
The trash, a fine and private place
But none, I think, would there you taste
Now, therefore, while youthful hue
Sits on thy shell like morning dew
Rather at once our egg devour
Than languish in denial power
We'll crack it open, strength and all
And poach it fast into a ball
And swiftly serve it up on toast
Simplest pleasures please the most
Though still we cannot make the sun
We'll pierce the yolk and make him run.
Fine cooking, readers, were no crime
We would sit down and think which way
To cook our eggs and take all day
My vegetable love should grow
Frittata-like and oh so slow
An hundred years should go to praise
Thine yolk, and on they pure white gaze
For egg you deserve this state
Nor would I love at lower rate
But at my back I always hear
Time's sell-by-date hurrying near
And yonder all before us lie
Deserts of vast eternity
Thy beauty shall no more be found
In broken shell, upon the ground
Your untouched fruit would turn to dust
And into ashes, my famished lust
The trash, a fine and private place
But none, I think, would there you taste
Now, therefore, while youthful hue
Sits on thy shell like morning dew
Rather at once our egg devour
Than languish in denial power
We'll crack it open, strength and all
And poach it fast into a ball
And swiftly serve it up on toast
Simplest pleasures please the most
Though still we cannot make the sun
We'll pierce the yolk and make him run.
Links, Resources and Further Reading
Bay Area Resources:
Eggs | Marin Sun Farm
Bread | from Mabel's Just For You Cafe
Other Resources:
Delia Smith | How to poach an egg
I Like It | IMBB23 is announced
Daily weight loss, weightwatchers and diet notes:
Poached egg on toast with a teaspoon of butter is about five or six WW points depending on the bread you use. How to survive a superbowl party on Weightwatchers? I have no idea - I'll let you know later!
| Archive Alert! On this day in 2005: The Ferry Plaza Wine Merchants. |
Food | Eat Local | Farmers Market | San Francisco | Eggs | Weight Watchers | Diet | Toast | Cooking | EoMEoTE#14 | Eggs & Toast
Sam, I love your paraphrase, it just to good to be true! And Marvell is actually an old favorite of mine so this was extra fun for me!
ReplyDeleteI am entirely in awe -- what? on six-day weeks???
ReplyDeleteLOL, brilliant take on an old poem. When we read this in school, we were asked how we would have responded if some chap said that to us. I answered if some chap told me I'd better hurry up and shag him before I became an old crone, I'd thwap him. LOL, guess I'm not very romantic. I like your poem a lot more!
ReplyDeleteWell done on the Marvell; I love your last line!! Excellent!
ReplyDelete-Elizabeth
P.S. (even though I loathe runny yolks)
eggselent !!
ReplyDeleteHi Sam, Absolutely brilliant. Thank you for making my day!
ReplyDeleteOh, take me!
ReplyDeleteLOL! That's a good one..:)
ReplyDeleteTruly impressive, not just the cooking but the poetry also, and once again I wonder, Sam, when do you sleep? Everything you do is so first rate. And since I know you are currently working six-day weeks, I seriously wonder how you can fit it all in.
ReplyDelete::Applause:: I'm an English teacher--and am having a total blast reading all these poems. Yours is fabulous! Love the last line!
ReplyDeleteIlva-Lucullian delights - thank you - it was fun to write
ReplyDeleteAK - for some reason unbeknownst to me paraphrasing other peoples' poems comes easy to me. It only took me about 15 minutes to do - I am wondering if I should change my blog to a poetry blog.
mm - the difference between a guy telling you that and Andrew Marvell is the beautiful way he said it. I think there is a romantic difference of sorts.
ejm - i was kind of lucky with the last line (it fitted in with the original poem perfectly)
mum - i am glad it amused you
cin - thank you
elise - any time you want to set me a sunday poem assignment i will be happy to oblige
cookiecrumb - doesnt cranky already have you taken?
sailu - if i can make people laugh then I must be doing something right, thank you
Kalyn - sleep - yes that reminds me it is almost time for bed
Cyndi - such words from an English teacher are an honour indeed, thanks.
Here's another English teacher for you: marvelous. (Oh god, and I didn't even intend that pun.)
ReplyDeleteThere's no point in me entering the Eggy contest now. You've outdone us all, Sam.
I really like this!
ReplyDeleteFantastic - and given your time contraints, clearly you have trained yourself to blog in your SLEEP! :o) I loved the poem - what next: the egg replies?!
ReplyDelete