Rhyme For Our Times

(With apologies to W. H. Davies)

Our lives these days are full of care, No barbers open to cut our hair, No gardener coming to cut our grass, No need to sort plastic from glass.

No children to get off to school. Or Greek holidays beside a pool. No churches open for us to pray, Or coffee mornings to fill the day.

No chiropodist to cut toenails,

No sport to watch when all else fails. Elderly grandparents not allowed to shop, And the park is guarded by a cop.

No dentists here to ease our pain, Mine self-isolates in Spain, And people do not any more, Fasten cotton to the door!

Holy Days meld into one, And all our sense of time has gone; No signpost marks out each day, Or if it’s April or if it’s May.

And though now we’ve no need to hurry,

All we do is fret and worry. Politicians tell us to keep our head, Otherwise we’ll all be dead.

Just wall-to-wall experts on TV; No books since they’ve closed the library. And can’t give the grandchildren a hug, Because of the b **** y coronavirus bug.

Now we’ve to hide behind a screen, Until they find a safe vaccine. So, what is this life if, full of care, There’s coronavirus in the air?

Jim Dixon, Rainhill, Merseyside.