In the evening
Ordinary days
Share a spindly trestle table
With mothers and fathers
Farmers and factory girls,
Put their feet up,
Lean their chairs back, shoeless.
Staring at their toes
Wiggle them to relax.
One hand sensing
The other hand's lifeline, on and off;
What will they be doing next?
Probably more or less,
What they were doing yesterday.
Glorious days have a conference desk
Of their own,
The gratification of having been promoted,
And the anxiety
Journalists will start calling
Sooner or later,
Historians will come back to them
For another diatribe
Whether they like it or not.
Shoed they rehearse
Their prominent role
Around-the-clock.
