At the Gran Hotel Bahia del Duque
As I trespassed in the leisured luxury
only the rich enjoy,
she came to visit.
I knew she was an aristocrat
by the pride with which she wore
her straggly, thistledown coronet;
by the way she bore
her sparrow-dun, jeroboam body,
heavy with old nobility;
by the strutting, serpentine neck,
with the understated iridescence
of one born to effortless grace;
by the cruelty
of her greedy
unhandy talons.
She stared from her claw-hammer head,
avid for tribute
from this obvious imposter.
Tongue-tied by her condescension,
I tried to charm her to reveal
all of her dowdy glory – until
bored with the impasse she twitched
her tail and left a calling-card
of peacock shit on my terrace.
Mike Farren is an academic publishing editor from Shipley, W.Yorks. His poems have appeared widely in journals and anthologies and he has been placed and commended in several competitions, including as "canto" winner for Poem of the North (2018). His pamphlets are Pierrot and his Mother (Templar) and All of the Moons (Yaffle). He co-hosts Rhubarb open mic in Shipley.