...Or A Cheat Poem by Douglas Scotney

A politician answered a question
other than the one that was put.

I wondered if she hadn't heard it,
or thought she'd answered it,
or deliberately didn't.

I was pondering if she was deaf or dumb or a dogmatist,
or a bit of
one and two or three,
or two and three,
or one and two and three;
and their implications;

when she put to me,
'ask not
what I can do for you,
but what you can do for me.'

She'd learnt it off by rote
and didn't acknowledge the quote.