POSTWOMAN
Postwoman, ply your metier
from door to door and street to street
in balmy sun or when it’s wetter
in rain and fog and slushy sleet.
And leave your bicycle to stand
outside a local pub or grocer’s
except where things are out of hand
and thieves ignored by law-enforcers,
then you must wheel it as you pop
from letterbox to letterbox
resting it everywhere you stop,
which slows you down like when you knock
at homes that lack postal access,
or when you deliver bulky parcels.
Once, as you chatted at a house,
I saw your cycle seized by rascals
complete with mailbag. Luckily
the theft turned out to be a prank
by youngsters on a cider-spree.
Postwoman far from being a crank,
you tongue-lashed the culprits, then set to
your task again, a pleasant hike
because the man you were talking to
kindly offered to mind the bike.
Whether bliss, indifference or woe
the tidings in your missives meet,
postwoman, ply your valued chore
from house to house, from street to street.
In a uniform labelled Post
that’s slate-blue and whose badge is green,
in summer plod through heat and dust,
through ice and snow in winter’s spleen.
© Ciaran O'Driscoll 2014
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