Bath Sharing 1975 Poem by Terry Collett

Come up
and see me sometime
she'd joke

knowing she lived
on the ground floor
and that seeing her

was never enough
for even that
short journey

I can offer you
coffee
and coffee cake

and maybe some fruit
you like fruit
don't ya?

Huh?
You know, fruit?
And she'd smile

that smile of hers
the kind of smile
to launch or sink

a whole lot of ships
and seamen too I guess
her coffee making skills

were OK
and the coffee cake
was fine in a dry kind

of crumbly way
but the fruit
well now that

was something else
and you had to be
in the mood

for the fruit
I mean there it was
laid out for you

ready for you
to indulge
get stuck in there boy

don't let it go soft
and she'd laugh
like she did

if I was kind of
getting to her
when we shared a bath.