Four Portions of Everything on the Menu for M'sieur Monet!
Back in 2005 I attended a Study Day at Tate Britain which focused on the Gallery s current major exhibition, Turner, Whistler, Monet. I made some notes, filed them and promptly forgot about them. A few years later they came to light in a notebook. Suddenly I found myself writing about Monet in London. Monet was a man with a very hearty appetite. I d gone to the Study Day on my own, but more usually I go to places with friends, or with my daughter. In one of the poems here I m accompanied by my Great Aunt Wave, and it is 1955. We travelled from Staines to Windsor on a Salters Steamer, which still steam along the Thames. In fact I recently saw the steamer again and I think it was the same one we went on in 1955! The common thread of the pamphlet is visits I ve made and experiences I ve had during these visits. Sissinghurst, Paris, Lapland, Galway, Wales, and Rome, are some of the places explored. I hope that this set of my travelling poems captures a sense of the energy I felt in each different locale. Penelope Shuttle July 2016