Doggerel Dave

Home Sweet Home

I, employed during 1981

As care worker with adolescent boys

Delinquent and referred from court; such fun -

Full of testosterone, agro, all noise.

The place had just opened and was brand new;

We staff were new although the boys were old -          

An outcome of their past on which they drew;

Surviving misfortune had made them bold.                   

They rioted but then it settled down.

The neighbors viewed them with much suspicion

When leave was granted, although not to town;

And boys roamed locally with permission.                    

Some youths returned after a local lurk

Kicking an odd shaped object to our door.

It passed between them using skilled footwork,

A goal! our office roof –  oh what a score!                    

But one day I finished there (which was wise)       

And rescued the football I found to be

A comic garden gnome with button eyes

Built of light fibre who I now set free.                              

During the unrest I’d been punched and kicked

Like violence to my gnome at end of day;                           

Much empathy with the friend I had picked

Prompted me to remove him from harm’s way.                    

I transferred to Sydney somewhat later -

As my trunk had some space he came with me.

Some would say my choice could not be dafter

Yet he stood by my door at peace, now free.                    

Though his rosy cheeks and vibrant fashion

Were lost forever to the Aussie sun;

No sunscreen for gnomes meant he was ashen -

A tan was not possible for this one.                                     

The Australian sunlight was too strong

And Wilfred* refused a hat with a brim.

So a gnome valet service came along

From the yellow pages to make him trim.                       

It was on Wilf’s return that he was seen

Without his cheery cheeks, perhaps for good.

A mellow brown face meant that he had been

Naturalized in the only way gnomes could.           

My quiet comrade now dwells in my loo

A nice position in that smallest room

He, immune from weather and kidnap too

Greets his guests with a fake rose in full bloom.     

Brown face he has, but inside he will stay

As global warming will affect us all

More so for Wilfred I would have to say

As last time exposure was a close call.                                  

*Not his real name. (smuggled in – didn’t complete immigration formalities).