Category: Postman

What a shame, what a shame!
With a sack on my shoulder and lead in my feet, each day is the same;
I must walk sixteen miles so a lot of silly asses can get a
whopping-big armful of magazines, then say in the same way:
“Is THIS ALL I get today?”

And so a lot of people who expect to have their mail dropped to where
they can reach it from their pet easy chair
Can have a large toothy Chow or German Police-dog tied so I can’t get there;
And so they can say, knowing full well, if he does, they won’t have to make it right–
“HE won’t BITE.”

And so the customers can bawl me out for not whistlin’–
I know it’s an old postal custom from back when the mail used to be light,
But the load of freight on my back now makes me feel more like bristlin’;
And in summer or in winter-time
They can make the most asinine remarks concerning the clime:
“ls it HOT enough for you?” or “COLD enough for you?” or WET enough for you?” or “DRY enough for you?”
Wouldn’t it bore you?

And so they can ask me to break every rule known to the Postmaster General,
To accomodate THEM, unabashed–
And then report ME if one end of a package I take them is slightly mashed.
And so they can say, sitting on their respective overstuffed patios I have not:
“What a SNAP you’ve got!”

And so the poor grocer right now can have a button,
Because he is nearly dead, tied to reports and coupons and point values,
While I hop around like Betty Hutton;
And if I stop to breathe 5 minutes in a grocery or filling station,
Folks think of the fact I can’t put in my time any other way that is an indication!

Here’s the-upshot of this poetic fit:
If I don’t like it, I can quit.
But I can’t argue and I can’t fight,
For the CUSTOMER is ALWAYS RIGHT!

And people hafta SOME amusement get:
Which is why we, as postmen, get paid, I bet.

by Ray Romine Sunday, April 11, 1943

I wondered why I should receive
Your literary missile:
Was it out of sympathy
For my bedraggled whistle?

Or were you feeling sorry for
The woeful way I’m dressed;
Or the way my shoes are never shined,
And pants sre never pressed?

Or could it be the load I bear
Had made you literary;
Or maybe all those miles I tramp
Had made you sorry, very?

Or possibly (O, surely not–
What with a guy like Jimmie)
That you had gone you wacky, and
Were fascinated wi’ me!

But I am onto all your wiles–
Don’t try to spoof your betters–
For that was just a line of “Bull”
So I would bring you letters!

Still–answer’s there for me to find,
If I were energetic:
It’s that we ALL possess this urge
To sometimes wax poetic!

by Ray Romine Tuesday, November 16, 1943

“Instead of restoring delivery cutbacks the Postoffice Department may have to curtail services even further.”
–News item

It’s almost enough to unnerve us,
And from paths of straight thinking swerve us,
When what’s cut to the core
They can whittle some more,
And still call the stuff “Postal SERVICE!”

by Ray Romine Friday, September 22, 1950

“Shut that window–pull that shade:
Of ventilation I’m afraid;
Turn off that electric fan,
Start the furnace up again.
Let there be no dearth of heat.,
To make each day for me complete.
I hate fresh air and I hate cold–
On the heat, though, I am sold.

“Turn that radiator on,
Save on coal when I am gone.
Shut that skylight overhead:
Open it when I am dead.
Knit my sweater tough and strong;
Make it warm and close and long.
Hand me down my ear-muffs, too–
No telling WHAT July will do?

“On all the sports I’ve put the bans:
I like the games but not the FANS.
I gag at sight or swimming pools;
Smoke any cigarette but -KOOLS.
Take away those ice-cream cones-They
further chill my freezing bones.
Fry, if you must, in your own sweat:
I’ve never been too hot, as yet.

“The Janitors are friends of mine:
They keep it 90 all the time;
Carriers crab that they can’t work,
But what’s a CARRIER? I’m a CLERK!
They may not like my kind of clime,
But they’ll get used to it in time.
Doctor’s orders, kindly fade:
Fresh-air-fiends are BORN, not made!

“Tons of coal are thrown, each day,
(Because I can’t keep warm), away–
Let the others swelter, please,
As long as I don’t have to freeze.
Song I very much admire:
‘I Want to Set the World on Fire. ‘
But that, I think, is quite all right–
The world is wrong, and I am right.”

EPILOGUE:

Well, if the heat decides to kill us
I hope to Heck it STARTS WITH WILLIS!
And when of Hell he gets a taste, ,
I hope he’s WARM–the PANTY-WAIST!!

by Ray Romine Saturday, June 26, 1943

Here lies one postman, brought to naught
Because he “also-ran”.
When Donaldson and Congress fought,
He was the middleman!

by Ray Romine Tuesday, May 16, 1950

When it comes to nerve, the POD*
Has no peer in its class–
It demands I have a sidewalk,
Then it cuts across my grass!

*Post Office Department

by Ray Romine Friday, April 17, 1953

Hardly an employee left alive
Remembers that famous yesteryear
When he was told, at age sixty-five:
“Scram, my lad, we don’t need-you here!”

What a lot of lifting a little bonus
Can do to an age-old old-age onusi

by Ray Romine Wednesday, May 17, 1950

In spite of’ dew;
Down draws, up hills,
The mail goes through–
At least, the bills.

by Ray Romine Tuesday, November 14, 1950