Poetry Jam: Chillin' with Margaret.

Which is, to my ears, a name which rather juxtaposes with the chillin'. I can imagine Chillin' with Mags, but not Margaret, even though she has provided us with wonderful images of staring into a campfire or lying in a hammock on lazy summer days.

Why is that? Perhaps my best friend at primary school, Margaret Crocker, a rather formal little Scottish girl. Or Saint Margaret of Scotland, the English princess who became a queen? Ooh, Thatcher has just occurred to me too.
Anyway, this is just as well, as having really thought about this week's prompt I realise I don't relax, and have no secret activity which helps me relax. If I am in the same country as my house, my family and my job there is always too much to do, even though most of the time I am just thinking about doing it rather than doing it. I only truly relax on holiday, and as my kind of outdoors involves historic streets and pavement cafes, it is cities, not beaches, which are my big thing.

Long intro for a short poem this week, apologies.
The rest of the Poetry Jammers can be found here: http://poetryjaam.blogspot.com/2011/06/for-20th-of-june.html

Dolce Vita

La Bionda and her flat-foot friend.
Isn’t that the way of these things?
I craved the Laocoön,
ever drawn to supposed original.
The queue meant suffering such beauty.
We wanted sights, fights, dodgy boys,
dropped down to the forum
buzzing vespa bellicosa,
ice-cream lips, snakish hips.
A whistle of rare tune, and pinches.
Warm culture stone of the Colosseum
beneath one hand, so many dead
Titus said, in another.
Exhaust-hazed sightline to the Senate.
Curia, comitum, rostra. Proclaim!
Empire virgins, learning foreign cities.
Care is something for home!