I was once fixed now set free. No one can ever again try to swing me. But in another world they would say oui, you are bound to be absolutely crazy.

The first tells jokes, of which you might laugh, wonder, or rage The second can be taking paint from a wall, or clothes on a stage If you're lucky, you can still find me on a newspaper page

I hoard forgotten treasures, dust motes dancing in my beams. My access is often treacherous, a rickety ladder's climb. I swell with heat in the summer, and contract in winter's chill, a silent witness to time's slow, relentless will.

I’m a hinge with no door, at the middle I bend. I help you wave, scratch, push or lend.

I stand guard in a pitiful place; Gelatinous fortress, an arid embrace. I fight a foe that you cannot see, but another sense is glad for me. I fade each day, a duty unsung: Yet without my touch, civility's stung.