JANICE AND YOU AND THE EVENING STARS.A Poem by Terry CollettA BOY AND GIRL ONE EVENING IN 1950S LONDON.
You sat on the edge
of the low wall in Rockingham Street opposite Meadow Row Janice sat beside you in her red beret and black coat buttoned up to her throat against the evening chill and you in your cowboy hat and old coat with your 6 shooter (capped gun) in the inside pocket the sky is thick with stars Janice said looking upward like God threw small diamonds into the black expanse reminds me of the time You said when I was with my old man outside Guy’s Hospital and he left me outside with my sister while he went in to see my mother who was about to have babies and I looked up at the sky that evening and it was like that and it seemed so big and wide and I remember thinking how I could get lost there if I were a spaceman looking out of the spaceship window at the stars and moon and such I could have been with you Janice said and have got you food and drink for the voyage I don’t know You said girls don’t get to go on space voyages do they? I guess not she said sighing but maybe I could be the first to go she added smiling sure you could but not with your red beret You said she laughed and looked up Meadow Row at the street lamps and the glow they made on the pavements and narrow road and she pointed at some kids outside the public house half way up the road and said Gran wouldn’t leave me outside a pub like that while she went drinking you gazed up the road and saw the kids outside one in a pram one sitting on the low wall eating out of a packet of chips my mother said it happened a lot in her days when she was a kid but she never was You said Janice tucked her hands under her armpits to keep them warm against the evening cold I better go she said Gran will wonder where I am ok You said I’ll walk you back and so you both got off the wall and walked up Rockingham Street to where she lived with her gran in an upstairs flat and she blew you a kiss from the balcony and that was pretty much that. © 2013 Terry Collett |
StatsAuthorTerry CollettUnited KingdomAboutTerry Collett has been writing since 1971 and published on and off since 1972. He has written poems, plays, and short stories. He is married with eight children and eight grandchildren. on January 27t.. more..Writing
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