Climbing in the Swiss Alps

 

Climbing in the Swiss Alps

It was a time of plenty

Nineteen Seventy.

I attended my first dinner party

at a semi in Bellevue 

and there between Liz and Mary

I first ate Swiss fondue.

It was a time before houmous 

a time before falafel

but I recall a weird vinegar mix

of red cabbage and stewed apple.

It was a moment of metamorphosis 

a phase transition in societal class,

a moment of social danger

should I fall on my working class arse.

But that was then 

and now is now.

Times gain was social ease.

So in Two thousand and twenty-six,

when I dip my bread in the fondue pot ,

I just savour the molten cheese.

'Spleeny' George Roberts. October 2026