Marking The Turn

They’d bailed out Ben from a broadband debt,
and Chloe from love, though she hadn't met him yet.
They’d paid for a wedding, a breakup and a car,
a therapist, two puppies, and a clinic in Zanzibar.

Their children, now mature, were experts in the craft
of converting monthly emolument into large overdraft.
They sated every whim with a callous disregard
of the spending limits applied to every credit card.

They rescued an engagement, then rescued the ring.
They rescued a startup pedalling hideous bling.
They paid off the landlord, the lender and the vet,
and a very persistent reporter at the Basingstoke Gazette.

So they disposed of their possessions with casual disdain,
and took a taxi to the airport, where they boarded a plane.
'We’re marking the turn,' said their father, with glee.
'We’ve now funded enough of their boundless esprit.'

They settled on an island of sunshine and sand,
where the mail was slow and the internet was banned.
They bought a small cottage, a hammock, and a goat,
and with what they were saving, bought a sailing boat.

For six blissful months they were gloriously free,
of constant messages filled with bright bonhomie,
extolling the merits of their stock market gambles,
ignoring the downturn and the inevitable shambles.

And then one day, out of the blue, a postcard arrived.
Markets had crashed and their children, now deprived
of resources, had splashed remaining cash on a dash
to the airport, and would be arriving tomorrow, to stay.

Stunned by the prospect, they hatched a cunning plan,
and loaded their catamaran with enough fuel and supplies,
to flee from the threat of their fiscal demise by chasing the 
breeze through a lengthy exploration of the Dodecanese. 

Audio: https://1drv.ms/u/c/4db44a4d6b88c854/IQBiEGVQgavpSra5iOWIFxXSAXa2e4kpr1S...