Sonnet Sunday: Shall I compare thee to a hot pork pie?

Special thanks to Sarah Connor and Jane Dougherty for this uniquely wonderful gastronomical sonnet, composed on the spur of the moment via a Twitter exchange:

Shall I compare thee to a hot pork pie?
No ta, nor neither steak and kidney, please.
And yet the scent of gravy flutters by
With sweet effluves of pale green mushy peas.

I dare thee, taste this deep-fried cod and chips
The crispy batter and the tang of salt
Malt vinegar, the subtle tang that nips
The flavour crisp and sharp as Cupid’s bolt.

Yet Brexit’s nets are full of fish delights
Though we’re divided by the sund’ring sea
And Ot’ley’s chippers closed now Sat’day nights
I’ll rustle newspaper and think of thee!

When love’s young dream’s a hot and pink pork pie:
Though crust may crumble, love will never die.

I think you will agree this sonnet has everything: food, love, topicality and timelessness. Well done ladies, I believe the Bard himself would be impressed by this effort!

It all started with this tweet:

Thank you to everyone who has taken part in Sonnet Sunday! I’ve had so much fun I’m considering making this a seasonal occurrence. Take this as fair warning to prepare your best Easter sonnet, with all its frills upon it…

Featured Image credit: Terry Kearney, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons



45 thoughts on “Sonnet Sunday: Shall I compare thee to a hot pork pie?

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  1. I have read through the various contributions to these theme. I enjoyed them and admired their artistry. Not sure if what I’ve written is truly a sonnet but here is my attempt:

    When First I Fell in Love

    When first I fell in love I was too young
    To know what love would do to my frail heart
    Bound up into a song I’d never sung
    I leapt into a world that fell apart

    I thought the love you gave to me was true
    It would endure until the end of time
    You it seemed was me and I was you
    Our words they formed a song in perfect rime

    But then your heart it turned away from me
    And left me in a desert all alone
    You said that you still needed to be free
    It seemed your love for me had turned to stone

    And so our love it ended and I cried
    Something new was born but something died

      1. Thank you, Don…particularly delicious when sung to Hot Chocolate’s It Started With A Kiss! Why they never settled on this lyric is, quite frankly, beyond me!

  2. The Bard would not only be impressed, he would be jealous; this piece is just that good, you guys. After all, Valentine’s Day is all about the food. So many people miss that in love poems, it’s no surprise why it’s one of the days with the most strife.

    Seriously, people, don’t forget the chocolate or the pork pie. A very well done sonnet. I enjoyed reading it greatly!

      1. Well my eldest is 8 but the language of the street is different in Slovenia…that’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it!

  3. You had to use the dictionary Ingrid. What ever is ‘effluves’ I thought? ‘A feeble electric discharge due to convection in a fluid dielectric under high voltage’ it says. Is this the lingo of sonnet writers Ingrid? Am I illiterate?…..

      1. Come my little robot
        Make my gears go grind
        I’m all oiled up and ready
        Let’s robot-intertwined

        See why I can’t write sonnets?
        I’m best at silly rhyme
        Two robots intertwining
        Describing this, I’m fine

        Love in the scientific age…

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