To sit in The Cambridge,
the air warm with excitement,
as beer flows and complements to the flavour
of the rousing conversational chase, back and forth,
hurriedly
slowly…
the odd glass or three of
Simon’s Cider peppering the aroma,
punctuated by a Ginger Goddess
staring into her empty glass with the shock value
of one in need of another
after a heavy day hitting the books,
the pages in between and the words beaten
into submission, black eyed, panda like,
sat under constant university
strobe flickering wildly,
being obscene
at
2 am,
by a crew so devout, they worshiped at the altar
of learning and beer, of games
and words and half stacked,
slightly torn and cracked place mats
thrown playfully at each other.
The laughter
carried far and wide from pub door,
flat packed tables
outside, half full with the casually left cigarettes,
ready rubbed, folded neatly,
smouldering away as they order a small round
for the flat packed students.
The Crew
packed together like sardines, their moments of reflective glory,
of collective despair
all ending in the same wonderfully absorbed manner,
to toast
and enjoy the salad days, with a sizeable
portion of steak
roughly trimmed
but tasting so sweet.
From the office workers,
to the girl who came into her own,
long black hair and the same coloured nails
ready to scratch at anyone who dares,
doesn’t win, not in this game,
but so loving it thrilled
us all.
The woman from so far away,
the sound of her language so cool
whose charm and life made us forget
who we were for a while
to the smart laced but so wonderfully adept
man
who made us
laugh so hard it hurt
with his back to front words
and asking for the Rum and coke with a smile,
to the girl with
blonde hair and the heady mix of Stockport,
Scotland independence and the finest smile,
for the Evertonian,
Royale Blue
Veins,
one of the best it was a pleasure to know
and the silky moves never left him.
The music rudely, but in some cases more welcome
than a free pass for a term,
makes its way past the tables
and sits down amongst the heroes,
no more, The Stranglers, at
The Doors
who would cause one to doubt his sanity
when reading up on the life of the Crawling
King Snake and his Heroine, poem filled life
The scent of an arrow flying through the air
carrying with it the dreams of the broken
and Time consumed
Time eaten away
was matched by the talk of the future,
one to get married,
one to find true love and her Newcastle smile
beaming brightly, one
going somewhere perhaps that we
will never keep up with her,
one who was wounded, her life now complete
and who will ever make us
smile with adoration when she realised that to like
Musical Theatre doesn’t mean you are gay.
Another who somehow you know will
end up running the country and who I was proud to sit
side by bruised side as we repelled borders
one afternoon in which regretfully
saw insanity rain and 24 doubles drank one after
another.
The Wirral poet sits back and reflects on
his life I almost feel envy for
as I do everyone who sat round the four tables
and drank, loved, sobbed, hurt, laughed
and talked…talked
on grey days, holidays, reading days and Winter day
in the Cambridge,
just a pub tale in which
I wish
I could
recapture.
Ian D. Hall August 2014.