Five to five

They’re dropping like flies
As the plague sweeps the ranks
Rows of workstations empty
While telephone banks

Ring loud through the silence
And gathering gloom
As Thursday-night callers
Take turns round the room

One lone operator
Soon pales at the noise
And grasps at the handset
With grimace in place

For over-mic’d trawlers
That given the choice
She’d give neither date
Time, directions, nor voice

It’s almost the hour
That her shift’s at an end
But one final nuisance
Is waiting to rend

The last of her sanity
Ripped down the wire
Complaining injustices
Crude, uninspire

No longer the patience
To handle such groans
She’s wanting her bed
And an end to all ‘phones

Examining Results

For once, I don’t know what to write
I’ve spent so long on call today
Informing others’ diktat soundbyte;
All my thoughts have flown away
Abandoning ‘mid dullest prose
And figures fed statistic’ly
Capacity of rows and rows
Of unexamined history
I’m homeward-bound and wish the best
To all whose numbers came to list
May you stand out among the rest
And never know this mill needs grist
I’d lend you wisdom of my years
If I were still bent on belief
But knowing such pearls find no ears
Would offer senses such relief
As may be had from silent smile
Of stranger truth than may be said
For soon enough you’ll have your milestone
Broke by others’ heavy tread

The Complaints Department

Nobody calling at the tail end of Friday
Has anything good to say
If they’ve left it this long, it’s a ticking time bomb
That they don’t quite dare leave ’til Monday

So the caller’s frustrated (and won’t be placated)
They picked up the handset to moan
It’s a cert they will dump ev’ry unwanted hump
Down the angrily crackling phone

I’ll be blamed for their woes, standing in for the foes
In their workplace they daren’t attack
For a frontal assault would be seen as their fault
The decision that got them the sack

So a dose of aggression is their contribution
To kick off my paltry weekend
And the favour I do them in listening to them
Will never be seen as a friend