John, do you have any idea what life will be really like
when you have broken your chains, and cast us all adrift?
Won’t you miss our stimulus and feel you want to fight
for our coincident sympathy whenever you feel miffed?
No more sharing your issues, always huge and massive;
no more sinking your teeth into others’ ills;
no more failing to be silent, or even just impassive;
no more contesting eagerly every battle of wills!
But if Fate thinks it can sideline you, it has got the wrong man.
If it plans to close you down it’s making a big mistake.
Can you engage your destiny? Yes, I know you can;
damn it, haven’t you won a new life, for Heaven’s sake?
But spare a thought for the rest of us as we sit around our tables,
spooning dollops of wisdom from some Resource’s offering;
craning our necks to listen to Leo’s whispered fables,
and marvelling at Brian’s publicity machine, yet again taking wing!
No more athletic triumphs on the indoor bowling rink.
No more dancing Irish jigs, trailing only Fattorini.
No more joining us, as our collective spirits sink
listening to our own Welsh warbler, and trying to do so serenely!
Yes, of course you’ve got a lot to lose.
But there’s a life to be lived and a business to sell.
For all of us there comes a time to choose,
and it is good to say: ‘didn’t he do well!’
For John Raines Smith’s retirement from TEC 5, Shrewsbury