Burnt Norton


How he caught fire no one knows,
maybe it was the sewer gases
on his dirty undershirt,

maybe it was the hat of halitosis.
Some say it was all the leftover
honeymoon sex

crammed into one hour of bliss.
Some say it wasn’t this,
some say it was the clematis.

It was, perhaps, spontaneous combustion
like the burning bush
and, Jesus! Trixie with an empty fire extinguisher.