Another Colin, seemingly as nuts,
As him whom I have spoken of before,
Same hospital, but on a different ward,
Whose mouth, once opened, never after shuts
To stem the sales pitch one can’t ignore,
The patter packed away and safely stored
For just such an event as this day seems,
He’s lying down, but in his mind he struts,
Before a willing audience he must not bore,
And to be truthful, none of us is bored,
When listening to his well remembered streams
Of knowledgeable chatter which relates
To printers and to copying machines.
He truly knows his stuff and must appeal
Not just to us, but those who count the beans,
And so statistics creep into the mix,
Which more than mere anecdote reveal
The era which he’s speaking of. He states
Them with such confidence and dates
Thereby his time of ‘usefulness’ when dreams
Were not allowed and truly never sought,
Except where they would help to spur him on
To greater sales figures which themselves
Were more than just sufficient a reward,
Although, of course the bonus pay was good,
He did not work this way against his will,
One senses that his patter was his fix.
He did not need incentives for he’d gone
Into this market gap in depth and thought
It satisfying simply in itself
This real need to cater for, fulfil,
And thus he spoke of what he understood.
But what is comprehension of this sort?
A life of dedication to a cause
That has no greater purpose, yet improves
The working days of others who care naught
For plain men such as him, whose long soliloquies,
Delivered with good humour, without pause,
For forty years perhaps, had kindly brought
Them the ability to undertake
Their daily tasks with ease. Faciloquies
Is not a word, but that is what we heard,
By accident because of some anomalies
Within the ageing brain, these monologues
Designed and much rehearsed, to sell such tools
As make life simple for such other fools,
As drudge in offices and make facsimiles.
Now Colin lies in bed, in summer heat,
And blethers on, repeat, repeat, repeat.
