I’ve Finished With Moving The Stationery Poem by C Richard Miles

When I look inside the stockroom,
I begin to pause, take stock,
As the key to all my questions
Is still turning in the lock,
For they haven’t fixed the fixtures
And the fittings don’t quite fit
And the chair of the committee
Isn’t one where I can sit.

But our stationery order
Is quite a work of art;
I won’t go from the beginning
But I’ll try to make a start
To get everything in order
And make a little list
And the others can add later
To sum things that I’ve missed.

We’ve run out of plain paper,
’Cos they’ve all made paper planes
And they can’t use watercolours
As we need them when it rains
To waste on pretty pictures
Just to try and keep them quiet,
So it will keep them occupied
And they won’t need to riot.

We might give cardboard to them
To stop them getting bored
But we’ll mark their cards for them
If they use it for a sword.
I can’t find the cartridge paper
And I hope I don’t get shot
And I only guess the glue gun
Isn’t stuck inside the pot.

Our thoughts about a guillotine
Were cut off by the head,
Who pointed out, quite craftily,
Craft Knives would do instead.
I wish he hadn’t made that
Cutting, sarcastic remark
But since we’ve not got blackboards
We’re not completely in the dark.

Since some went inside the playpen,
We’ve gone and lost the pens.
We’re at sixes and at sevens
And it isn’t even ten
And I’m not exaggerating,
I’ve told them a million times:
“If you’re asking for lined paper
You’ll be writing me some lines.”

If they want to do some drawing
That won’t do them much good:
You only draw with drawing pins
If you want to draw some blood.
And, though they’re only staples,
They’re the main necessities
In the classroom, where the answers
Are now locked inside without keys.

They won’t eat the sugar paper,
For it isn’t very sweet
And the only good use for rubber
Is for plimsolls on your feet.
I can’t find the tracing paper;
It has vanished without trace
With the hundreds, tens and units,
Which don’t seem to value place.

They sent us wooden rulers,
But I wish they wouldn’t rule
That they won’t send us scissors
Since they’re not cut out for school.
They’ve lost the tape on the Sellotape,
Which they seem to have gone and sold
But they said the silver paper
Would turn out as good as gold.

Though no ink now wells from inkwells
In amounts enough for baths,
The order for graph paper
Needed all four paragraphs,
For we needed to redouble it
Since it was just too squared,
Not that anybody noticed,
Nor that anybody cared.

The order for the paper
Went on and on for reams
And we almost nearly folded
And went beyond our means
As the cost of document wallets
Used up a wad of notes,
Though we saved a bit on postage
With economy post-it notes.

Though the principal is principled,
We really have our doubts
That we’ll not get what we’re wanting
And there’ll be reduced amounts
Of coloured mounting paper
Unless he cooks the books;
Our tempers will be boiling
With angry, red-faced looks.

And, as for all the felt pens,
We never even felt
That they would last for ever
As the children have all knelt
On them, on all the carpets
Which now look like works of art
Made by that mad Jackson Pollock
But not just quite as smart.

The spelling books are useful;
We’ll use them for a spell,
Then throw them in the dustbin
As they’ve gathered dust so well.
The exercise books are missing:
Have they gone for exercise?
And the quota for music manuscript
Has been soundly minimized.

It’s getting rather stuffy
But I don’t quite want too feint:
I prefer much wider spacing
But I’ll toe the line like a saint
If they will give their backing
To the backing paper orders
And I’ll resist temptation
To repel all the borders.

It was a sticky problem
About how much glue to get
But it looks as if they’ve fixed it
And it’s finally been set
But if we want pencil sharpeners
We’ll have to look quite sharp
Or we’ll miss them in a corner
Underneath the piles of scrap.

The debate over protractors
Was more protracted than
War and Peace’s first edition
Read in pieces by my gran.
On reflection, all the mirrors
Might come back one day
But the orders for the compasses
Seem to have lost their way.

Now they’ve broken all the rulers
Like they break each classroom rule
And I bet my bottom dollar
They think that I’m a fool
When they say they’re stuck; I tease them
And tell them not to use the glue
And if they ask for paper:
“Can’t you find some in the loo? ”

As I shuffle through the items,
Wondering where to put them next,
I can’t seem to find the blue-tac
And I’m starting to get vexed,
As I start to feel much bluer
And assume I’ll lose all tact:
The final straw is looming
Which will break this camel’s back:

As Miss has now gone missing
And the head has lost his head
And nobody will listen
To the words that I have said,
I will have to keep on fighting
As I’m going on about
Whether stationery could be stationary
So I wouldn’t have to shout.