Victimisation as threat and control
She’s the village’s Force For Good –
or that’s the flag she sails under;
news of distant earthquakes, floods,
famines, ethnic or other massacres
are her stoke-up calls…
she’ll soon be knocking at your door,
or coming up to speak to you at the WI
or after church…
knowing that you know she knows
you know the details of just how fortunate
she thinks herself, to have survived
that terrible childhood (details vague) :
so by extension, you should know yourself, and show yourself,
fortunate too… by giving to the latest cause…
Have her in for drinks, and her roving eye
will spot that electric towel rail you don’t now use
which would be just the thing which would alleviate
the widow Smith… Though, should that widow Smith
dare to grumble to her – and she’d sharply (with a smile)
remind her, aren’t we lucky, dear, we’ve got
the Social Services here, while they, poor things…
How she delights in, praises, our new outfits
which we bought last week in town!
We don’t need to be told what follows
as the night the day – we should have
a still-smart something to pass on to her…
though I’ve yet to see an African
caught on TV wearing my old Top Shop number…
Sometimes, husbands take the mickey..
‘How is it that now we no longer hear
about the Burmese tragedy, Martha, now
the orphans of Darfur are in the news? ’…and
in private, joke to us about calling in Miss Marple
to root out the village emotional blackmailer…
The one house in the village and the largest
is the one she least often calls upon,
and that only in the afternoon
when the housekeeper’s in, but the owner’s
still at work: Alan was a kid to five adoptive families,
three of whom were good… now he’s the owner
of a large industrial firm whose workers love him…
At their first meeting, when she tried
her own pathetic story, his curt
‘Oh get over it..’ has sealed their subsequent relationship…
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poem by Michael Shepherd
Added by Poetry Lover
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