BEASTLY TALES

BEST FOOT BACKWARDS

Elmer approached nuptials at a tender age,
When galloping hormones were all the rage.
A few years ago his wife ran away,
And Elmer’s been walking backwards to this very day.
Was this a psychological reaction?
Yes, a conscious retraction.
From what Elmer regarded as a horror of life,
To be abandoned by one he though a caring wife?
This strange reversal of natural habit, yes reversion,
A subliminal reaction and a physical perversion.
Reactionary to the horror of betrayal,
As normalcy works through to portrayal.

Elmer did, indeed, put on a fine front,
As he navigated backwards, or to be blunt,
Walked back foremost, into the night,
Startling folk with this unusual sight.
To achieve ambulation he had to lean backwards,
An unusual state whilst navigating track wards.
He was required to hold a head turn to ninety degrees,
Even then, no guarantee he wouldn’t walk into trees.
Or any other obstacle in his retreating path.
Folk who would see him, seemed obliged to laugh.
But they did not know how low his heart was, truly.
How very broken, how despairingly unruly.

His bank would call, account again in arrears,
But this was the least of his manifold fears.
Of course, perpetually walking in reverse,
Made the business of job hunting distinctly worse.
His friends, those who were left, would say,
“Walk backwards by night, but forwards by day.”
But Elmer would have just none of that,
He had to walk backwards, and that was that!

He finally held down a job in sales.
Yes, selling mirrors, up hills and down dales,
Hand mirrors, in fact, just the very thing,
To make the cash registers ring and ring.
The ideal aid for those ambulating in reverse,
A rear view mirror could only make things better, not worse.
If this market had a strict limit,
There would be other ways to overflow brim-it.
All that would be required would be deep thought,
But, then again, perhaps it would come to naught.