The highway castle

Old Mater lives for rent in the highway castle,

Just off the 34 in Switzerland, Basel.

Selling premium air for flat tyres,

Sucker-scamming unsuspecting passers-by.

He feeds the road with nails and shattered beer bottles,

Feeds himself on crab legs and pictures of nude models.

Enter: a double-decker full of Americans, senile.

Mater slips on his tie, his sharkish smile.

He’ll get them on their way soon enough,

Assures them not to worry.

Meanwhile, why not take a look around his shop?

Are they not tourists—why such a hurry?

He’s got keychains and magnets, snake oil in bottles,

Pretzels and doughnuts and Münster miniature models.

What’s that? The prices are too steep?

Well, geez—in these mountains, nothin’s cheap!

But since they’ve all become friends now,

He’ll let them buy two and get the third for free.

So when the visiting folks set off again,

It’s with much lighter pockets,

And old Mater chuckling 

As he’s counting his profits—

Now his sister stops by to check how he’s doing,

Though he suspects it’s his money she’s really pursuing. 

Still, he takes her to the seafood joint

Beside his rented castle,

’Cause he gets so few visitors out here on the highway—

For most, it’s far too much of a hassle.

And since he’s got no licence, he never leaves;

He treasures the small attentions he’s lucky to receive

Old Mater never got round to finding himself a wife;

No dogs, no children, no grandkids in his life.

Suppose sometimes he gets to feeling a little lonely,

He tries not to think about it too closely.

A swindler, a hustler, a rest-stop king from Basel,

Eating crab legs in the turret of his rented castle.

He waits for someone to come passing by;

He takes their money

When, really, what he wants is their time.