Move Over (old man)

A commentary on progress...

 

 

“Excuse me, old man,

I need to get by.

I’m in quite the hurry

To get to something done.”

 

(Who am I,

To talk to you like this?)

 

“Hey, I’m progressive, man,

and I’m doing things

So, please…

step aside,

with your old-head

building plans and cheque-plaid

dungarees.”

 

“What?!”

(the way his granddaddy did it?)

 

“You’re living in the past, dude.

They don’t stick-build anything,

nowadays.

They don’t use sticks, and

‘hand-built’ went by the way

of ‘homemade’”

 

…………

 

“Please, old dude,

I gotta pass you.”

(F**k, this guy is sooooo slow,

Nothing will ever get done.)

 

“Yeah, if you could just

stay a little closer

to the right,

I can get through.”

 

(oh boy, he wants to see my plans?

What’s with these old people,

needing to see a plan?)

“Yeah, I don’t have

full-blown plans, but I have an idea,

And some other people waiting on me.”

 

(God! He won’t let this go!)

“OK, BUDDY!, now you’re pissing me off!”

 

“Fine, we’ll go at your pace,

but you’re standing in the way of

Progress!”

…(A*****e.)

 

© Stiver 2009

 

Author's Note

Does the word "progressive" in this piece, flatten out the character?

Reviews

[Emily B]

Progressive is okay where you've put it, in my humble opinion. We pick up pretty words so often. And try them on and priss and preen . . . but, oh, looking back, we always realize how stupid we must have looked.

The funny part of my read here, is that I spend so much time in 1860 . . . that I sympathized so much more with the old dude. And stick building. Architecture rocked back then. We could learn so much by the things that have gone before. If we just took the time to study.

Hope all is well in your world.