Three Poems

Bed and Breakfast in the Berkshires, Mass.

O Molly G. what a welcome you gave us -
Of scrawled notes with few directions more than
'Help yourselves'. And what surprises too
As open-mouthed we saw the Piranesis
In the study, Le Corbusier, Picasso,

Blake and Arp and Calder up the stairs,
Escher tucked away in corners, and in your room,
Where other paying guests might themselves
Have drawn a line, the sombre Vlaminck
Landscape thundering above your bed.

At breakfast more notes, but not one that told
How to make the toaster toast, and the Berkshires'
Biggest ants that tumbled in the dish
With Cheerios and fled across the cloth,
The hoard of bottles where we sought the trash.
...