(A reflection on youth)
We were daring back then,
reckless, hungry even
I remember that time
during your break for lunch
the ridiculously busy street,
busses hissing, rattled past us
in the recess of a shop’s fire exit
busy passers-by smiling,
perhaps an embarrassed snigger
at the young lovers, but
I was already inside you,
I held you there impaled,
hot wet, swallowed up
within my black greatcoat.
Do you remember the photo booth
in the run-down arcade?
You straddled me
like a horsewoman, rising trot,
the black greatcoat spared our blushes
like an air raid curtain, and
we laughed as we ran
forgetting to take the photographs.
And that other time......
I’d raced the ninety miles
through early evening lashing rain,
in a hotrod ruby beetle
you’d named Jeff
after a rotund mate,
we, steaming
in the cowering queue
for our friend’s gig,
under fizzing lights as
the wet world circled around us
taking shelter,
but you had already drawn me up
and buried me, hand-held safe,
and after
always giggling, greedily
famished,
you licking fingers,
my juices
masked by salt and vinegar
impregnated
upon my black greatcoat.
© Graham Sherwood 05/2016
