[Janet Kenny]

John Betjeman at the Supermarket


I cannot bear to even see
a supermarket, much less be
inside this ghastly philistine
insult to proper food and wine.

The customers seem unaware
that only savages could bear
these ersatz products. ‘They’ remove
the taste so none can disapprove.

Indoctrinated and ill-dressed
the masses have become obsessed
with dried tomatoes and goat cheeses,
pizzas to put in their freezers.

The vulgar chic of magazines,
means all have tight designer jeans
and fantasies of Tuscany
now far removed from Italy.

They gossip on cell phones so we
can envy their prosperity:
“I’m at the biscuits now. How’s Kyle?”
For this she blocks the shopping aisle.

As legionnaire’s air circulates
with muzak, traffic gravitates
to pet food made from ground-up beast.
Canned kangaroo for pussy’s feast.

May all their stocks and shares collapse
and then some day we will, perhaps,
return to modest places where
we taste the food and breathe the air.