I Like To See People Stoking The Fires Of Fight In Their Lives
It gives me Hope
and that’s a rare enough commodity
these days.
In this Land of the Frowning Shadow of Doubt,
where Apathy Rules, Unchallenged,
by Careful Indifference.
Fuck You Clouds
She was sat upon a broken wooden bench
that I’d seen some Melyn Skinheads
smash a pub payphone upon a few days ago,
three miles in the hills out of Town.
I climbed over the fence stye at the bottom
of the slope that I had just been gathering
magic mushrooms upon and stopped
to light a roll-up around 12ft or so away,
observing her casually as I quickly did this.
She was wearing a railway workers donkey jacket
that looked about two sizes too big for her.
Ripped, bleached jeans and muddy para boots
with a blonde and purple finger length Mohawk.
She had a glass flagon of Strongbow in one hand
and a half-used glue bag dangling in the other
and she was sobbing lightly, tears running
down her dirty yet pretty, young face.
“Are you alright?” I asked as I walked passed.
“Sure, I’m just staring up at the Fuck You Clouds
…please leave me alone and go away!”
And so I did, unexplainably a lot more troubled
than I had been, by miles, a carefree hour before.
© Paul Tristram 2015
They Did It While I Was In Borstal
My Mother warned me about the change
on one of the visits that it had taken her
a good seven hours to achieve, one way.
Yet, after being Home and finally sobering up
after three days, enough to venture through
the Town with ‘once more in focus eyes’
it was still strange to behold, almost alien
and made me feel slightly sick to my stomach.
They had pedestrianized the entire Centre.
Dug up the Roads and Pavements of my Youth
and layed down pretty red bricks in patterns
for the Townsfolk to safely walk around on,
with new black litterbins and ornamental lampposts.
I remember a man in his fifties getting hit
by a truck and dying right in front of us teenagers
with a 3ft halo of seeping blood around his head
(We had to step back to not get any on our boots!)
outside the middle doors of the Market.
My Uncle Pedro getting hit by a speeding taxi
on the Corner by Marks & Spencer and spinning
like a children’s top in the middle of the Road.
About twenty of us ganged-up and being chased
by Riot Vans down Queens Street one Winter’s night,
standing our ground and Winning, Victoriously.
But all of this Lost and Gone Forever, Now!
I grew to Love it after awhile, I slowly learnt
affection for my Hometown’s New Face.
But for a short time there, I felt like I’d received
a ‘Dear John’ from my Birthplace, not back in Prison
but actually upon stepping back upon those streets
which held the Essence of my Heart, Soul & Blood.
© Paul Tristram 2015
that I’d seen some Melyn Skinheads
smash a pub payphone upon a few days ago,
three miles in the hills out of Town.
I climbed over the fence stye at the bottom
of the slope that I had just been gathering
magic mushrooms upon and stopped
to light a roll-up around 12ft or so away,
observing her casually as I quickly did this.
She was wearing a railway workers donkey jacket
that looked about two sizes too big for her.
Ripped, bleached jeans and muddy para boots
with a blonde and purple finger length Mohawk.
She had a glass flagon of Strongbow in one hand
and a half-used glue bag dangling in the other
and she was sobbing lightly, tears running
down her dirty yet pretty, young face.
“Are you alright?” I asked as I walked passed.
“Sure, I’m just staring up at the Fuck You Clouds
…please leave me alone and go away!”
And so I did, unexplainably a lot more troubled
than I had been, by miles, a carefree hour before.
© Paul Tristram 2015
They Did It While I Was In Borstal
My Mother warned me about the change
on one of the visits that it had taken her
a good seven hours to achieve, one way.
Yet, after being Home and finally sobering up
after three days, enough to venture through
the Town with ‘once more in focus eyes’
it was still strange to behold, almost alien
and made me feel slightly sick to my stomach.
They had pedestrianized the entire Centre.
Dug up the Roads and Pavements of my Youth
and layed down pretty red bricks in patterns
for the Townsfolk to safely walk around on,
with new black litterbins and ornamental lampposts.
I remember a man in his fifties getting hit
by a truck and dying right in front of us teenagers
with a 3ft halo of seeping blood around his head
(We had to step back to not get any on our boots!)
outside the middle doors of the Market.
My Uncle Pedro getting hit by a speeding taxi
on the Corner by Marks & Spencer and spinning
like a children’s top in the middle of the Road.
About twenty of us ganged-up and being chased
by Riot Vans down Queens Street one Winter’s night,
standing our ground and Winning, Victoriously.
But all of this Lost and Gone Forever, Now!
I grew to Love it after awhile, I slowly learnt
affection for my Hometown’s New Face.
But for a short time there, I felt like I’d received
a ‘Dear John’ from my Birthplace, not back in Prison
but actually upon stepping back upon those streets
which held the Essence of my Heart, Soul & Blood.
© Paul Tristram 2015
Paul Tristram is a Welsh writer who has poems, short stories, sketches and photography published in many publications around the world, he yearns to tattoo porcelain bridesmaids instead of digging empty graves for innocence at midnight, this too may pass, yet.
You can read his poems and stories here! http://paultristram.blogspot.co.uk/
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