Vice Versa

 Vice versa

A song about an anvil

Oh hard lump

Hardest of metal chunks

Beaten on daily

The hammer head

How can you take the pounding?

The ringing in your ears

Must be astounding

What a vice!, What a virtue!

What a curse! What a curfew!

To be tied down

Screwed to the bench

Just to know you can never wrench free

But you look over to your cousin

In Engineering

The vice,

What advice would you give he?

He is always under pressure

Never a go getter

But always a setting free

Please release me

The wood and metal cry out!

I can't I can't

The vice says back

With mouth filled

Lock jaw

Jaundiced

Bulldog grip

Snap shut

Break its jaw with

A gun butt

Oh no

A bullet wouldn't do it

A lead sandwich

Soft

And you can hear the Anvil ringing again

Always engaged

Talking in the sound and fury

The inane beating of the hammer stroke

Progress it says

Is second nature

Produce

Secure

Resound and stay

Safe

Close to the furnace

Bellows pumping

And iron thumping

Like a beating heart

The hearth and heart

Of home