Hot Paris – on the kind of day
you need to trudge from shade to shade.
No respite in bread and cheese.
Lilies float inside the Orangerie.
We try to see which sits on which
and which mark, which scritch
which squirming line best undoes
the messy light and leaf shadow.
But first in French and then in English
the invigilator warns us of the sensors.
(I decide not to steal a Monet
to prove to her that I am manly)
From Clamart we’d got up to see
the fly past through binoculars,
the Eiffel tower, the tricolore.
The almighty mighty military.
Grass strip that leads from Invalides
with tanks, and guns, gendarmerie,
to state – “no more monarchy
nor no second Bastille day”.
Tuilleries sand still on our feet -
skin dry as crisps. Both tired
both angry. We snooze beneath
the shifting sea.