Letterboxes

This is what I should have been doing today, but alas I am stiff in all the wrong places...

Letterboxes
(by Chris Young, with thanks and apologies to Malvena Reynolds)

Letterboxes on the doorfronts,
Letterboxes going snippy-snappy,
Letterboxes on the doorfronts,
Letterboxes hurt and maim.
There’s a high one and a low one
And a small one and a narrow one.
And they all stick or go snippy-snappy
And they all hurt just the same.

And the Focus for the houses
Was written by the candidate
But he won’t touch letterboxes:
Letterboxes hurt and maim.
So I take them and I fold them
And I try to deliver them.
But they all scrape or go slippy-slappy
And they all hurt just the same.

Now the front flap on the letterbox
Is stiff or goes flippy-flappy
And it bruises all my fingers
And it traps them in the frame,
Which is filled with rows of bristles
Which crumple the leaflet up.
And they all jam or go scritchy-scratchy
And they all hurt just the same.

As I bleed upon the leaflet
It stops at the inner flap
And I have to wedge it open
With my fingers in the frame.
Then a dog jumps at the doorfront
And tries to bite my fingers off.
And they all growl or go yippy-yappy
And they all hurt just the same.

So the leaflet turns to dogfood
Or gets snagged in silly curtaining
And gets tangled, further mangled:
It is all part of the game.
When the owner gets the leaflet
It must be half-illegible.
And they’ll never vote Libby-Demmy
But it all hurts just the same.

Letterboxes on the doorfronts
Should be subject to regulati-ons:
Never sideways, all at waist-height,
Letterboxes all the same.
And the dogs should be sedated
And the hinges lubricated fully.
They’d be simple and not knicky-knacky
And they’d all work just the same.