Rugby, Warwickshire
16/10/2015

Unholy streets of G-d, liquid tobacco,
gentle froth and steam
from the coffee estuary, split beneath the clock tower
on the idle hour; more pigeons than people,
more buildigs than choices
on this small-town, charity shop parade.

The women are still beautiful, still unattainable,
still on the brink of a breakdown
in the most confident dress.
Street-pastors carry the drunks home,
the street-cleaners appear by the afterparty,
clear out the old bottles
before the commuter picks up cigarettes
from the newsagents that never rests.

Tattoo parlours, barber shops,
Christmas on the radio come Hallowe'en-
this is the town that crazy built:
war-time poetry, jet propulsion,
chief inventor of sport,
of mild alcohol addiciton.

There's hundreds of places to get drunk in this town,
hundreds of places to hide away;
a foreign face in a sea of family and friends.
Landlocked, gridlocked,
centrally located but left out on a limb;
this town clings to the tracks,
it's avenues of escape
the only margin to keep the residents
out of mind and in their place.

But this is where I grew up,
always more car-park than parkland,
my first steps on Campbell Street,
on Armstrong Close,
first time I broke the law on Bridget Street,
on Selborne Road.
I'd push my bike all around this town,
no stopping off for a smoke,
for to get my fix-
I'd push on and on past graveyards and open bars
without a second gance.

Now, it's all shooters and soul-singers
and happenstance;
chicken wings on a late-night binge,
a box of wine, a night of sin,
wake up in shame,
life's a guessing game
and guess what, you'll never win.

Chewing gum, patches,
vapour that scratches the back of my throat,
nicotine in my blood,
you know, I'm trying my best to get clean.
Blister packs of vitamins, bowls of fruit,
buying coconut water over the counter-
green tea by the rising moon,
incense sticks and vegetables in the garden,
yet by the time night rolls on by
the locus of my eyes, they darken;
I'll be back on the beer,
I'll be smoking a carton.

This is the town that crazy built,
even the flowers by the roadside wilt,
cement factory, hum-drum poverty,
post-code belonging to Coventry,
kept out of the war
by a matter of minutes,
kept from the future
by corporate interest.

Hospital lights, supermarket glow,
I can't remember the last time
I wasn't loaded with chemicals
every time I get home,
every time I sign out
and put my head on the pillow,
I see familiar streets, familiar signs,
the job centre, the floodlights,
the 12% lager, the twist of lime.
I struggle with rhyme,
I struggle most days to get out of the house,
but at night, I know, that sea of doubt
is a river of light, to ruin my liver,
to spike my fever, to calm me down.

There's hundreds of places to get drunk in this town,
and this world it don't spin,
it just throws me around.

I was raised in a market town
with nothing to sell
but the notion of escape
to higher planes
and better times.

Landlocked,
the bars only serve
to bring you down
or to distract you with sports news
and the price of beer.

The drunk crowds assemble
in uniform fashion,
at a routine time
with cyclical conversation
and a lack of expression.

With no time for a future,
we focus on the past,
memories of fuller wallets,
of that potential lover,
now a passing glance.

Still we drink and we meet
to satisfy our days,
to turn our sorrow
into laughter,
and to keep loneliness at bay.

I do not agree that there is a ‘forever England’.
How could I, when I can’t even recognise my face?
For all of the innocence that died in a decade,
For the concrete and car parks
Built over my childhood's place.

I have seen this town grow
through the tides of my time,
to the low and call of the market men,
to all of my drinks laced with lime.

The cracks form in concrete,
as they do to my aging face,
but never are the streets unrecognisable.
No, here, I can always find a place.

And the clock tower calls,
just to signify the passing day,
oh, all of life’s sorrow falls
to the saying: “come what may.”

I know you all, I’ve seen you crawl
through these jobs; waiting tables,
pouring wine, and shooting pool
in the stagnant afternoons;
claiming your past as part of mine.

Rupert Brooke is now but a name,
some archaic poet of yesterday.
His name now naught but of drinking fame,
as all the customers line up to pay.

Oh, I miss my childhood, old friends now past,
only stark reminders that nothing is built to last.
I need you now, my lifelong friend;

to my soul, give warmth,
to my heart, please mend.