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I wrote this in response to a prompt which simply said 'Shopping List'. I nearly discarded it, thinking I had nothing to say. But I made myself do it, and gave myself a 15 minute limit to finish. In the end, I'm quite pleased with it. But then, I am a massive egoist.

Do I need anything from the shops?

I do. 

I do need something from the shops. 

I need a place to queue with a human at the end I need a little conveyor belt to put down my stuff that will Smoothly trundle it obediently away So I can put down more things Without creating a mad tower  Of milk and magazines and four packs of beans In one square foot of self service space

I need a real life person with a badge and a hat to pick up my shopping and make it go bleep Someone who knows Where to find the bloody bar code Who won’t spend half an hour Turning the bread round and round and round But will slip it, professionally, under the laser, first time.

I need a human soul, who won’t get confused By a three gram difference in weight. Who expects there to be items in the bagging area. Who won’t make me wait for assistance while  A venomous red light flashes in my sad, lonely face.

I need someone who can look And see by my thinning hair and the lines round my eyes That, yes, I can be trusted to buy These four bottles of red wine.

Someone who’ll remind me that I have parking to validate Who’ll smile as they wait for me to fish out my coupons Who’ll give me ten seconds of genuine interaction And treat me like a human Rather than another machine, doing the work of the company

Do I need anything from the shops? Yeah I need to feel like they value their workers rather that tolerating them Until they can think of a way to sack them all off And give half their jobs to machines And the other half to me

If they don’t have that Then I can probably do without whatever else they have.