Chateau D'Yquem

I’ve been around, I’ve played the field.
No comfortable monogamy for me;
Variety’s the thing.
I have my favourites of course.
The ones I return to time and again – satisfaction guaranteed.
I’ve learnt the pillow talk,
I know what patter brings them to my table.
The duds I forget, the gems stay with me forever
Like the first magical encounter
With that seductive little number from Lebanon.
As dark as Homer’s sea and rich with silky tannins.
Then there were those New World beauties,
Young, brash, yet gloriously fragrant.
But my old man’s lust would not be sated
Till I had tasted the queen of Sauternes,
Chateau D’Yquem – even the name enchants.
Since I was a young man I have yearned for her,
To explore every intimate nuance of her form and structure.
An exotic golden legend, lovelier with every year that passes;
Rotting fruit conjured into the drink of angels.
A friend claimed he had her once – a chance encounter.
An explosion of flavours, he said,
Layer on layer, intense, lingering on the tongue forever.
But I didn’t believe him, fate couldn’t be that cruel.
And then she smiled on me.
An orgy of coruscating vinous delights.
You should have seen me work the tables;
The time honoured minuet of sniffing and sipping and spitting;
From Rhone to Pommerol to Nappa Valley.
But all the time from the far side of the room she beckoned me
That peerless temptress - a magnum of honeyed gold.
But the teasing and the flirting and had to stop.
That consummation so devoutly wished for, was at hand;
I closed my eyes and prepared to swept away
By that glorious maelstrom of sensual pleasure.
And I waited …and I waited… in vain.
No bells, no whistles, no moving earth.
It was OK. Quite nice really. But that was it.
Embarrassed, I made my excuses and slid out of the door.
Perhaps the chemistry between us simply didn’t work,
Perhaps I was loosing my touch,
Or was it simply that the time for cocoa and monogamy had arrived.