Footnote

 

Footnote

 

You removed yourself from the WhatsApp group,

that much you did – it is certain,

you drew down the curtain – it says ‘left’ –

and not a moment too soon.

Some people leave footprints upon the moon,

they made their mark there

and it is possible – but difficult to prove,

that those same marks still stand –

what with the lack of wind up there, no air,

those prints could be indelible for all we know.

You were absent all this last week,

a naughty little bit of hide and seek

after you’d trousered the leaving rate

so, where will you go?

Oh, you arrived as so many do, the big ‘I am’, this is ‘me’,

have a care what you say – this a ‘step down’,

‘my husband, you see him? A big wheel.’

Turning, turning – you come, you go,

always the same story blow for blow –

first the quiet sulks, then the complaints

they’re turning cartwheels about you,

then closing your doors, hugger-muggering

in corners, blowing hot breath on tinder and kindle,

pumping the treadles, turning the spindles –

until the presses roll, to strike the 1000 sick notes.

Well, they noted your absence at the leaving do

with all the interest of an automated customer service line -

couldn’t make it? That’s fine,

in the end, another waste of time,

a sour grape in a sour bunch,

convinced of its own vintage, self-authenticated

burning bitter in the gullet, but uncomplicated,

ordinary vin plonk – author of its own joke

and nothing but a footnote.