A Man's Best Friend is his Duck

42 years ago today, we gave this boot-scraper to my father on his 60th birthday. I chose it because he loved the Goodies' song A Man's Best Friend is his Duck, and especially the line parodying a Kleenex advert and delivered by Tim Brooke-Taylor, "a duck is strong even when wet"!

My father never scraped his boots on the duck, despite its potential usefulness after working the heavy clay soil of their garden. He said it was far too beautiful for that, and kept it indoors as a door-stop. I dedicate this blip, not only to my father's memory, but to the  fun-loving, gentle, intelligent comedian Tim Brooke-Taylor, who yesterday lost his life to Covid-19. So very sad.

My poem for Day 13 of the National Poetry Writing Month 2020 challenge:

Despite Coronavirus

The blackbirds sing. The ducks still quack.
The flowers still bloom. The lambs still bleat.
The grass is green. The sky is blue,
and we have food enough to eat
for now.

Our teeth still rot. Our hair still grows.
Our children's feet will need new shoes.
We keep apart. We stay enclosed,
but we will try to stave the blues
somehow.

© Celia Warren 2020

Thanks to trisharooni and hildasrose, respectively, for hosting the MonoMonday and the National Poetry Writing Month challenges.