Thursday, 16 February 2023

Sore Thumb

 Sore Thumb

 

True enough, Dobson once had a sore thumb,

making it freely hard to keep time, to strum

more often on the offbeat rather than on the on.

But Andrew, no George, no Patrick, no Taff,

standing out like the room’s plainest pikestaff,

is a guppy speared on bully Dobson’s billhook,

frowns in the doorway with his finger crooked.

Boxed ears of corrugated pink cannot listen,

blind misty eyes blink sorrow’s dismay, glisten

with reproach, might bear a newborn lake,

flares his nostrils from inner hard dried cake,

a foolish morning boy who forgot how to scrape

or bow and how? Touch this one’s temples;

the sparks that will fly can only disassemble

to rearrange his worlds into scrambled eggs,

his down-pulled lips of tickled pout just beg

Dobson to lift cardboard cup; drink of dregs.

Nothing a quick chop slap might not sort out,

but ‘sore thumbs were made to suck,’ Pat shouts

and ducks. Shrugs brows with an ancient guise,

has swallowed more than just digits to appetize,

reorders the world’s menu and wait till it comes

because it’s true Dobson once had a sore thumb.





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