Olive (October)

Olives were an hors-d’oeuvre, on a pick with cheese cube, in our childhood. Olive was on British Paints colour charts, we could paint a door olive. We were bottled up. The Mediterraneans changed our English ways: scattered in pizzas, fresh with fish. Salty or sweet, black or green, we were on a Grand Tour without leaving our kitchen. Kalamata, Spanish, we called them out at market. Olive oil flowed. Olive trees were spotted in nature strips. Hors-d’oeuvres became antipasti, a whole meal. We got on planes for well-watered places like Italy. Groves covered October hillsides. The world was our olive.