Caught Between A-Rock and Hard-Place
© 2007
Dan Johnson

I take the daily commuter train to work. It goes from the town called A-Rock to the big city known as Hard-Place. On one particular day we commuters were treated to an unexpected surprise; this is how it happened.

It’s 7:07 and the short hopper is preparing
to leave the station,
taking hard working
fools like me to the concrete plantation.

Choo choo, chug, chug chug,
not a very poetic sound,
but today’s payday,
so it’s off to work I’m bound.

Snow’s falling. coffee in my hand,
just to warm my innards.
About half way to work is the small town
Of No-Chance where there’s a real quick stop.

Engineer Joe and his assistant known around
Town as Mr. Bob LaBow is making this iron horse
move quick as possible to Hard-Place.
snow is falling harder now, sticking to the ground.

Just outside of No-Chance, trains a slowin’
not doing the sleek steel dance. Movin’ slower
now creeps to a stall. Waitin’ for an explanation,
why we’re not movin’ toward the concrete plantation

Then the bad news comes,
what could be the problem?
conductor Karl goes from car to car
stating, “It’s OK” just a few minutes, we’ll be on our way.”

Snows’ now falling fast, windows frosting,
heat turned down, all the time we’re waiting
for the news…when it arrives…we’ve got the blues.
And this is what we hear from engineer Joe.

“Sorry folks” he starts so slow, then asks
what I can’t believe…”As you know we’ve just
left No-Chance and we can’t reverse, only
cuz then we’ll suffer the engineers curse.

It seems that we forgot to check the fuel gage,
here on the cluster, so what we need to ask
is if y’all can muster up
the cash to pay for a little help from AAA.”

Then he continued with mud on his face,
“Truth be told if we don’t get the money
that we need, here is where we’ll be a sittin’
someplace between A-Rock and Hard-Place.”

This poem was really written by Poet Signatorious, Igor Schaworsky from the planet Zuton