Hazelnut Cream and Chicory Coffee

[DieterM]

It all comes back to me
The hazelnut cream on a slice of black bread
The steaming mug of chicory coffee on a grey Formica table
Through half-open windows, a lawn mower’s distant summer anthem
And joyful screams from kids splashing in the public swimming pool next door
The sticking pages of the new book that good grades have yielded
Barbie sleeping on the blanket outside
Amidst the smell of cut and drying grass
Tarzan ready to swing in the weeping willow’s low branches
And a kid’s oblivious freedom to ignore yet fully know
That everything is perfectly in place

[Jack of Hearts]

Ah, idyllic youth. Sometimes it's good to put on those rose colored glasses and look back.Nicely done Dieter.





J

[Delta40]

You trigger some really good smells in this poem Dieter and thats always a strong point.

[Hawkman]

It is very good, Dieter, with something of Houseman's "Blue remembered hills" about it. The images are potent with nostalgia.

I think I might suggest replacing of with from in L5, otherwise one really needs a definite article at the start of the line. Also, replacing mowed with cut in L8 to avoid the repetition of the mow bit.

Is there any particular reason why you went for the long lines? I'm just curious because they would accommodate line breaks, if you felt so inclined.

A very satisfying read. Thanks for sharing.

Live and be well - H

[Jerrybaldy]

Very evocative and enjoyable Dieter. I would add tastes and sounds to the good smells mentioned by Delta. I wonder what became of Tarzan, did he tire of swinging in later life and how many lucrative divorces has Barbie been through?

[DieterM]

Thanks everyone for commenting. This was just a bit of nostalgia brought about by a sunny morning walk to work (at last, Hawkman!). Thanks btw Hawk for your suggestions; I hesitated to re-use "mow" but wasn't sure about "cut" (one of those non-native speaker hesitations, I reckon). As for the long lines, I tried line breaks but wasn't really satisfied neither by the visual impact nor by the form. So I went for the long lines…
Well, and for the rest… lawn mowers will always remind me of those carefree summers, I think. The famous Italian hazelnut cream is prohibited in my life now (only my mom will always insist on buying the family size jar whenever I come to visit her), and the chicory coffee has been replaced by the real thing, several times a day. Tarzan will soon turn 40 (ouch) and doesn't swing from weeping willow branches anymore, and Barbie's still single and waiting for her Mr. Darcy (and I have it from first hand sources she will not do without a hairy chest)
;-))

[AuntShecky]

Yep. "Evocative" is the word. By the bye, do people still drink chickory? I guess it was a useful substitute for coffee back in the rationing days of WWII.
Chickory grows in abundance along the roadsides in my neck o' the woods. Sometimes they're called "blue sailors." If you pick them and put them in a vase of water they instantly fade, so generally I leave them be. I've never dug one up and boiled the roots for a beverage, though. How does it taste?
Do you put cream and sugar in it?

[Bar22do]

Dieter, this is good, so enjoyable and: "a lawn mower’s distant summer anthem" is perfect (in addition to bringing back my own memories of that sound)!

[DieterM]

TY again for commenting. Dear Aunt, I remember my grand-mother always mixing normal coffee with chicory coffee, a leftover of the war-years. I don't know if chicory coffee is still very much in use today but when I was a kid, I wasn't allowed to drink real coffee for grown-ups (it's not really very good for a kid's health anyway), but my mom would buy a brand called "Caro" (which still exists) and which made a "coffee-surrogate" as they called it made of wheat, malt and chicory. Hence the chicory coffee in my poem, a mix of memories about my granny and that Caro-stuff my sis and I rather liked (we'd feel like grown-ups of course). And us being Austrians, of course, we'd add milk and sugar. I've lost some of that Austrian heritage, I must say; today, it's very strong black coffee with sugar (and only in Viennese cafés I'll still take the real Austrian coffee with cream...)

[Twota]

beautiful. ;D