Hi-Falutin’ Poetry Sunday. by Ira Maine Esq.

I knew..Oh God I knew, seeing him coming up our road, I knew just why he was here, and it was all my stupid fault. He was the local borrower and I was his latest victim. His absence, his failure to present himself recently at my doorstep,  had been a singular source of relief to all who slept, ate and gave thanks at our Tolmie household. Yet here he was, bold as brass and  right as ninepence, bowling up our road, hand raised in amicable salutation, and prepared, undoubtedly, to enter into yet another form of abstruse negotiation which would, equally undoubtedly, involve my being left without some other essential bit of small farm equipment, not for a day or two but for frustrating weeks on end.

The kids looked at me wonderingly. Georgina, the light of my life, on the other hand, also looked at me, but with an infinitely more demanding, more suspicious eye.

‘How on earth?’ she exclaimed, watching our visitor through the window, her eyes wide, her expression a trifle startled. When she’d calmed, she turned her gaze in my direction, her expression inquisitorial.

‘We have’, she began, her teeth just beginning to grit, ‘just bought a very expensive, all mulching, all mowing, top of the range, whizz around the paddock mower.’

I swallowed hard, nodding, already consumed with guilt.

“Yesterday, you spent an hour at the local hostelry, if I’m not mistaken?’

I nodded abjectly, clenching my fists in preparation.

‘Was Jock there?’ she asked, her stern crochet needle indicating our still outside visitor.

I tried a nonchalant shrug of the shoulders, but instead found my fists pounding minutely and penitentially against my guilt-ridden chest.  Consumed with it all, I broke down.

‘He was… He was…’ I sobbed.

‘And you, ‘ she went on remorselessly,’ perhaps happened to mention…?

Choked with guilt, I could barely speak.Sobs of the smothering variety beset me on all sides. (Why is it that wives can induce guilt in us even when there’s not the slightest thing to be guilty about?)

Abruptly there was a pounding on the door. The Light of My Life looked me in the eye, her gaze fixed and resolute. I quailed in the face of such righteousness. There was only one reason why Jock might be here; he wanted the mower.

Then suddenly, out of nowhere, from the Gogolian lower depths, I realized I’d had enough of this bloke’s presumption. I knew, absolutely knew that I had not even mentioned our latest acquisition whilst at the pub. I also knew that I had hardly exchanged two words with him during my relatively abstemious visit. And now, despite all of the foregoing, I still found myself  preparing to invent well-mannered, plausible excuses why this particular person couldn’t bloody well waltz up and expect me to accede to his demands.

Across the kitchen table, cups empty, he stood up, hat in hand, ready to depart. There had been no mention of the mower. At the last moment he turned, as if struck by an afterthought, a matter of little consequence

‘Ah,’ he said, ‘I almost forgot…’

My heart, as I held the door open, began to beat a little faster. He grinned apologetically.

“Do you mind if I borrow your mower  for a couple of hours? If I shove it on the ute now I can have it back here by six.’

I looked him straight in the eye, not quite unflinchingly, and with all manner of weak and well rehearsed excuses still battling to burst out of my hypocritically well mannered mouth.

I took a deep breath, heart pounding and shook my head.

‘No, sorry,’ I replied, as casually as I could, ‘I don’t lend it out.’

Shocked, he stopped and glared at me in stunned disbelief. This had never happened before. He had been so sure of himself. His expression was, in rapid succession, surprised, then dumbfounded then just a smidgin angry. He looked at me again, checking to see if I had been joking. Finding no change there, he hesitated, looked as if he was about to argue then, nodding abruptly, turned on his heel and left. His body language was very much that of the thwarted man. I’m sure we haven’t seen the last of him, either. He’ll be back, on the off chance I was having a bad day but we haven’t seen him for some time now.

The Light of my Life was very pleased with me, I’m glad to say and I’m now officially back in the good books. All creature comforts have been restored.

In the same vein, I very much enjoyed the poet Adrian Mitchell’s attempt to deal with the same situation. Mitchell’s poem is entitled;

Ten Ways to Avoid Lending Your Wheelbarrow to Anybody

1 PATRIOTIC
May I borrow your wheelbarrow?
I didn’t lay down my life in World War II
so that you could borrow my wheelbarrow.

2 SNOBBISH
May I borrow your wheelbarrow?
Unfortunately Lord Goodman is using it.

3 OVERWEENING
May I borrow your wheelbarrow?
It is too mighty a conveyance to be wielded
by any mortal save myself.

4 PIOUS
May I borrow your wheelbarrow?
My wheelbarrow is reserved for religious ceremonies.

5 MELODRAMATIC
May I borrow your wheelbarrow?
I would sooner be broken on its wheel
and buried in its barrow.

6 PATHETIC
May I borrow your wheelbarrow?
I am dying of schizophrenia
and all you can talk about is wheelbarrows.

7 DEFENSIVE
May I borrow your wheelbarrow?
Do you think I’m made of wheelbarrows?

8 SINISTER
May I borrow your wheelbarrow?
It is full of blood.

9 LECHEROUS
May I borrow your wheelbarrow?
Only if I can fuck your wife in it.

10 PHILOSOPHICAL
May I borrow your wheelbarrow?
What is a wheelbarrow?