Toxic Assets

We all have one, don't we fellas...

 

'I have to go to town,' she said,

'We'll catch the early bus.'

She'd overdrawn her credit card,

I knew - she always does!

 

I groaned and then I moaned a bit,

I'm just a country clod,

'I hate the crowds in town,' I said,

'I'll stay here, on my tod!'

 

'You'll come with me,' she said again

And used that piercing look,

The one that gets her everything

She wants, by hook or crook.

 

So there I was, adrift in town

While she went to the Bank,

To sort out her finances with

Some guy she knew as Frank.

 

I hung about outside, and watched

Her enter through the door,

Like some black hole in space, I thought,

And shuddered, like before.

 

I hated banks, and managers,

And credit cards and schemes,

They'd offered me a credit card

But I said - 'In your dreams!'

 

I wouldn't touch them with a pole,

I just believe in cash,

But wives are like some aliens

Straight from the planet, 'Splash!'

 

They love to shop, and flash the card

And buy their nicky-nacks,

While we just moan and humour them

Then pay the money back.

 

And so I stood and waited there,

My patience growing thin,

She seemed to take forever in

That bank, so dark within.

 

I always knew she'd be a while

She talks a lot, my wife,

She likes to tell the tellers all

The story of her life.

 

I stood for twenty minutes there

Just hung outside the door,

I thought, I'll give her half an hour,

Then just a minute more.

 

So that I did, and half an hour

Just wasn't quite enough,

I counted off a minute then

And thought, 'I'll call her bluff!'

 

I charged head down on through the door

Just like a rampant bull,

Ready to jump and yell and curse,

I thought the bank was full.

 

But when I raised my head to see

There was nobody there,

Just a row of grinning tellers:

'Can we help you, sir?'

 

'Where's my wife?' I yelled, irate,

There was no other door!

The tellers said in unison:

'Go see the manager!'

 

I did, and he was sitting there

All plump behind his desk,

With dollar signs in both his eyes,

I nearly went beresk!

 

'So where's my wife,' I yelled at him,

'She came to sort things out;'

But he just pointed to a chair:

'Sit down - no need to shout!'

 

'We had to bundle her,' he said,

With all the other debts,

'The time has come,' he said, 'we have

To dump our toxic assets.'

 

'She's just a liability,

Is always overdrawn,

She's bundled, will be auctioned off

To some poor sap, at dawn.'

 

I staggered off in quite a daze,

Just what was I to do?

I'd have to cook the evening meal

But just for one, not two!'

 

And then the paper said next day

That Wall Street had collapsed,

The world economy was sick,

And gasping, had relapsed.

 

And like a pack of dominoes

Each country bit the dirt,

They said that they'd lost billions

With debt, the world was girt.

 

And then, it seemed, they traced it back

To some small Aussie town,

One woman, always overdrawn

Had brought it crashing down.

 

I found her planting veggies in

Some old guy's vegetation,

He'd said she had to make it up,

His superannuation.

 

She got the bill last week, and cried,

She said she'd pay it back,

Two thousand billion dollars she

Has hanging round her neck.

 

And so I had to part with her

I know just who to thank,

I'll always see her entering

That black hole, called 'The Bank.'

 

David Lewis Paget

Reviews

[Linda Marie Van Tassell]

If it weren't so sad, so relevant to the world economy today, it would be funny. As it stands, however, your poem is a tome to the tremendous tragedy of the so-called "world economy." As always, you embrace the truth of today and turn it into something meaningful for generations to come. Sadly, the majority of men can relate to the woman in this narrative. :o) Very well written as always.

[Valentine]

WOW..I did not expect the Wall Street ending..I am laughing my head off at you as usual..You are so funny and now that I know what your Aussie voice sounds like I can picture you reading your rhymes..Terrific write my Aussie Mate..God bless..Valentine

[C.T. Bailey]

Now then David, that makes far more sense than the jibberish I here from "the street." A great narrative sir. Poor guy...there are some that would love to figure out a way to package their toxic assets. Very nicely done...as always!