The Polish Plasterers Poem by Richard George

An imp and a boy king,
between them not a syllable
of English. They rake our house
with AK-47 Slavic staccato:
not a derivation-crack
to peep through for my Latin and Greek.

Falling cadences.
Every sentence ends with them.
Leather-suave, their interpreter:
my bathroom is now a set
from the film MOONLIGHTING, and right on cue
it starts to snow - in Warsaw.

'Tea, coffee, orange? '
I might as well be a good host.
What they need is a ladder,
and they hand me a crumpled hieroglyph;
don't-know-wheres with a don't-know-who,
trailing their skill and pride.

Crisis talks. Two more hours? ?
(I slug some Smirnoff) . Half past eight
and they want to hoover my staircase...
please, I am delighted,
let me go! Laurels
and they're still not happy. Thank the Lord for strangers.