Ode to Gore Vidal

The Simplon Orient Express
Was an eventful ride
We kids laughed at the overweight adults
Our comments undisguisedly snide ...

We'd intended to go to Gstaad!
To bask in Greta Garbo's aura
But Mother got lost somewhere in the Paris Metro
We ended up in Venice ...

Then a boring summer on Capri ..
Strolling at night in the Emperor's Villa
Something makes you keep looking up as if to see
Beauteous glowing orbs
Arriving from some place like Neptune ...

And on to Rome
Our new Home!

Quick Change of Scene:
Benedict Canyon Drive, Los Angeles, twenty years later
(Twinkle twinkle little star!
The Polo Lounge was our neighborhood bar!)
And there in the kitchen
My stupid mother
After kvetching on and on about becoming a "grass widow"
Hearing me ask "Did you ever know Gore Vidal?"
(He's got some idiotic house on the mainland opposite Capri
So he can ride the bus and pick-up snotty Italian teenagers)
Says

"I always meant to go say hello to Gore
But I never got around to it."