Joining friends for a joyful reminder that wine is bottled poetry

when children live at a distance, friends become the immediate support.

Maurice Spillane: Of Poetry Swindon

their topic.

The unwritten rule is no blind tasting, so nobody is set up to fail. In the last year we explored Gascony, The Sherry Triangle, New York State, Campania, visited Burgundy, and invited guest speakers.

We are friends who enjoy wine and indirectly look out for each other.

I often reflect that

As a group we have fun, tease and debate, and appreciate our diverse views.

Our monthly sub is a decent budget for wines we wouldn’t buy as individuals.

We finish the evening with everyone’s contribution to the food table.

It’s an inexpensive social evening.

Learning and curiosity are perfect bedfellows, and there’s the cross-over with poetry.

Poets as friends learning and sharing is no different to friends sampling wine with a keen interest in grape, producer and terroir. And as much fun.

I’m no expert but I’ve certainly improved my knowledge on both fronts. So raise a glass to a cross-over poem, Ben Jonson’s ‘Song to Celia’:

Drink to me only with thine eyes,

And I will pledge with mine; Or leave a kiss but in the cup,

And I’ll not look for wine. The thirst that from the soul doth rise www.mauricespillane.co.uk

Doth ask a drink divine; But might I of Jove’s nectar sup, I would not change for thine.

If you’d like input on setting up a wine group, let me know.