Ode to the Bin Man 

Each week I plan with precious care

the things I leave outside.

I pack them up and place them there

with love and earnest pride

Each time I work to have them waiting

placed the night before.

I know your path will lead today

your feet will pass my door.

I hardly ever hear you,

but I know that you have been.

You leave a trace that you were here

Though my eyes have never seen.

But on one morn, I was caught out

and found under prepared.

The sound of your approaching

had me flying down the stairs.

Pulling on my trousers

Iʼm racing to the gate.

To catch your eye before you go

before you seal my fate.

Spilling out onto the ground

just like my best laid plans.

My heart gives way as you depart

my shame held in my hand.

Itʼs premature collection.

My bins are overflowed.

And now I'm forced to wait a week,

in fear I watch them grow.

The ever growing mountain

of rubbish in my yard

has now become the round-about

around which I drive my car.

And then the folk in China

Tell us that no more

can they take away our pile of shame.

It seems weʼve lost the war.

Oh Romeo where art thou?

Will I ever hear the sound

of your engine strong, that throbbing song?

Where are you to be found?

Recycling man my hero

what will become of you?

Will council grant you leave to go

and find a path more true?

So for now my plastic bottles

pile right up to the sky.

Buried under cardboard stacks

beneath them I may die.

Bin man Oh sweet bin man

I think of you each night.

I hope that youʼll return to me

and set these wrongs to right.

Waiting ever hopeful

that youʼll return posthaste.

For now my house of trash it grows

swelling my hard waste.

Collection however premature

So sweet has found the end.

Into that hole we tip our souls

Farewell to thee my friend.

© Tim Henshall 2019