We have an automatic house
It runs on well oiled wheels
No one needs to clean it -
Or cook any meals.
Our dinners all prepare themselves -
Breakfast and lunch like-wise
Including all the vitamins
That food experts advise.
And after clothes have been worn
What do you think they do?
They leap back into the cupboard
Washed and dried - folded too.
Food appears on larder shelves -
No slow supermarket queue.
Library books renew themselves
Before they become overdue.
We have a bathroom robot
And that must be true,
For no one ever needs to clean
The basin, bath or loo.
We crawl out of bed in the morning
And sometime during the day
The counterpane creeps over the bed
And the wrinkles all go away.
As everything runs by itself
I have nothing to occupy my day
And have to resort to writing bad verse
To keep the boredom at bay.
Summer 1982
