Poetry
The Meeting
The room fills slowly.
Staff trudge in, mugs in hand.
The uninitiated carry note pads and pens.
The experienced smuggle in magazines
Stowed inside the covers of departmental folders.
Jostling for the back seats,
They perch in clutches.
Latecomers, distance denied them,
Reluctantly fill front rows.
Speakers misfire enthusiastically, unknowingly,
Pumped with their status in the brooding room.
Somnolence spreads its protective wings.
Staff roost:
Eyes open and glazed.
Minds asleep,
Bodies numb.
The drone lathes against the collective consciousness.
Information:
Photocopied,
Collated,
Stapled,
Distributed,
Dams the stream of discourse,
Replacing communication.
The meeting closes with a gavel jarring knock.
Like birds in a sun shower,
Staff shake themselves.
Caffeine -craving induces a hasty departure.
© Christine M Knight
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