The height of bad boy expression,

fifteen years old and hanging

on the corner, holding your mate’s fag

in one unseen shaking hand

whilst casually sipping

on a can of cheap, devilishly sick

beer, brought from the off licence

as he looked over your shoulder

at every car that went past in case

it was an off duty policeman

ready to nail his arse to the ground

for supplying you with the means of courage

to talk to the girl who was flavour

of the month in your diary,

bound over

and hidden away in a draw stuffed

with odds and ends, bits of string

and metal screws, aluminium foil

which made no sense and contradicted

the scuffed magazines of black stocking legs

and delicate bowed panties

on the thirty year old woman loved across

many tastefully coloured photographs,

in which you always promised

as the music blared out across your bedroom,

your domain, that one day you

would chuck away

in another bin, on the paper round

in exchange for a sly bottle of milk,

delivered by doorstep as the paper

shot across the hallway floor;

you waited as bad boys do, the first

patches appearing on the back

of the denim jacket,

the sweat starting to appear

at the thought of the first line

in which she might snort

with derision at…

she is there, she is in front of you

and she smiles

and all the bad boy macho crap

falls apart, you would pay

a million pounds

to see that smile,

stubbing out your pal’s fag

to his cries of indignation

and passing him the beer to chug,

you move forward…

a timid creature in a woman’s world.

 

Ian D. Hall 2016