Escape from a Pre-Computer Office

The office clacks and shrills at quiet folk
As silent thought, reflection, count as sin;
The castigations – clatter, haste and smoke –
Its victims cannot think in all the din.
When guilty lust for peace stirs up and pleads,
The firmest city creature’s will grows weak
Disabled by the body’s urgent needs,
So then the trespasser creeps out to seek.
The Bosses keep the still holes to themselves:
but one small place of rest remains exempt
and there no prying Manager can delve
on pain of earning popular contempt.
Yet like a desk-job this serene retreat
Is nothing more than paper and a seat.