The Timewasters
Lesley Mountain
Lesley Mountain (center) was winner of the first James Kirkup Memorial Competition, with her poem The Timewasters.
She is pictured here with compeition judges Alistair Robinson (left) and Tom Kelly (right).
Saturdays we get up late, sleep for nine hours
if we can, linger through toast and marmalade
as our eyes shuffle over the Small Ads; wonder
what we won't buy today. Weekends used to be
so boring, even we had too much time. Now
we have notions. You fancy an apartment in town,
me an Irish Wolfhound or a Suzuki motorbike,
though neither of us can ride one. We meet
all sorts - posh people with horses, harassed
parents selling pushchairs, desperate old folk
raking around their toolsheds. We flush toilets,
question pedigrees, poke and prod, look keen.
The cars are best - coasting under the speed
limit, taking wrong turnings down back roads,
inspecting crankshafts. Back home, worn out,
we snooze the evening away, take long baths.
I do my hair, you polish your shoes. Monday
we'll hold up the bus queue as we rummage
for change; go to work where we'll wait for
the computer to boot up, fill in forms, admire
colleagues' nail varnish, watch the clock drag.
Photograph © Roger Cornwell, 2010