I do love Rick Stein. As does Teresa. She watches his stuff daily! Ought I be worried? She’s cooking in the kitchen now (smells delicious), and Rick’s on in the background.
One of the things I love about him, is his love of culture. He often talks about art, music poetry, and suchlike. And just a moment ago, he slipped in a short poetic extract – ‘A sweet disorder in the dress / kindles in clothes a wantonness’ – I just had to immediately look it up.
Turns out it’s an old’un:
A sweet disorder in the dress
Kindles in clothes a wantonness;
A lawn about the shoulders thrown
Into a fine distraction;
An erring lace, which here and there
Enthrals the crimson stomacher;
A cuff neglectful, and thereby
Ribands to flow confusedly;
A winning wave, deserving note,
In the tempestuous petticoat;
A careless shoe-string, in whose tie
I see a wild civility:
Do more bewitch me, than when art
Is too precise in every part.
By a certain Mr Robert Herrick. A new name to me. Or so I thought. But everyone know the phrase ‘Gather ye rosebuds’, surely?
Having just learned who Herrick is, or was. I’m beginning to like him a lot! His poem, The Vine, essentially a near psychedelic dream about his willy, is fabulous.
And the ending of To His Muse are an entire compendium of a philosophy of life in just two lines:
That man's unwise will search for ill,
And may prevent it, sitting still.