Man’s world
From gardening, Joe Bennett can stray/ so the editor threatened his pay. To teach him, she set/a challenge he met. So she said that his column can stay.
Joe Bennett rises to the limerick challenge.
Generally when editors send out an SOS I yawn and go back to bed. But not when the sender is the editor of this illustrious magazine. She had barely finished typing the first S and I was in her office casually bowing.
“Ah, Joe,” she said (and I wish I could convey on paper the mellifluity of that voice; it has bellbirds taking a vow of silence), “I need limericks. Limericks are in. They’re retro, ironic, zeitgeisty, ahead of the curve.” “What curve is that?” “The learning one,” she said, “which you need to start climbing PDQ. Because I’m relying on you to solve our limerick shortage.”
“Absolutely, your Wondrousness,” I said, and prepared to put pen to paper. “And nothing smutty.” I returned the pen to my mouth. “Our rivals in the glossy market are thick with limericks. Bridal Monthly groans under their weight. Steam Train Gazette hauls hundreds of them out with every edition. But in the NZ Gardener no limericks grow.
“Your column is to feature a minimum of three. Each must be witty and horticulturally themed, involving the name of at least one plant, shrub or other vegetable entity, and not just shoe-horned in for the rhyme. You get my drift?”
“What drift is that, your Delightfulness?”
“The remorseless drift of columnists towards unemployment,” she said, smiling one of those smiles that has astronomers reaching for the smoked glass. “And one other thing. The limericks are not to be laid out in limerick format because otherwise readers will spot them coming and will simply go straight to them and skip the rest of the jewelled prose for which you are so absurdly overpaid.”
“But,” I exclaimed, “won’t that make the limericks hard to spot? Inattentive readers may miss them altogether which will send them off to Bridal Monthly for their fix.”
“Readers of the NZ Gardener,” said the editor with a fervour that caused the desk between us to hum like a tuning fork, “miss nothing. Now go to it.”
“Of course, your Impeccability,” I said, and with the easy familiarity that characterises our relationship, I sank to my knees, scooped a little dust over my scalp and crawled backwards out of the office.
But I’ll admit to being troubled. How was I going to get three pertinent gardening limericks into my remaining 200 words? And how were the readers going to recognise them if I didn’t set them out as such?
In the lobby, the kind-hearted Delia looked up and said, “Joe, I can feel your pain at the task that the editor’s asked. Here, have a consoling lobelia.”
I took it and sucked thoughtfully on its purple florets but it wasn’t what I needed. And nor was the woman who was now bearing down on me, a frosty fellow contributor, whose company I didn’t enjoy and whose name I could never recall. But there was no avoiding her.
“Look,” I said, “I’m sorry, this ain’t gonna please ya, I’ve forgotten your name.”
She said, “Freesia. And it’s apt, I am told, for my manner is cold, but that doesn’t excuse your amnesia.”
As always, the lobby was full of all sorts of people just hanging around in the hope of catching a glimpse of the editor or just a whiff of her almost unprocurable perfume. They found various ways of passing the time. A crossword fanatic called Josh looked up at me and said, “Gosh, I’m seeking a horticultural sport. Can you think of one?” “Yes,” I said, “squash.” “Thank you,” he said.