Mike Shields
Knowing Brass
Do you know brass? they asked
at the Admin party. With a suit
like that, you must.
Brass? You mean that yellow
alloy, copper-zinc, sixty-forty?
Or maybe that old mellow
band blowing softly from the past
some summer Sunday?
I know Admiralty brass, I said,
bell-brass, clock-brass, horse-brass,
and even Rig-house and Brass-trick
brass, from the land where brass
is muck is money.
The joke was now shim-thin:
in Admin, humour isn’t funny, brassbound
as they are. So,
back to brasstacks, I say yes I know
what you mean, and no
I don’t know brass, ask the Queen
of Personnel, she’ll know, she’s been there,
she of the brazen hair and brassiere.
But, for myself, you see,
though I know brass,
I doubt if brass
knows me.
Page(s) 56
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