Guitars resting from last night’s session
Lie snug in their warm-lined cases.
Cold hands fumble for the keys’ impression
Then tighten our scarves around our unshaved faces.
Chord changes, rhythmic shifts we barely mastered
Tumble round with lyrics half remembered
As we pass Stuart’s house, still dark, the lucky bastard
Has a day off. We’re still lumbered
With ten hour shifts that make it
Hard to work, rehearse and gig, we
Really work a double shift, can’t fake it,
And now huddle in the bus stop for a ciggy.
The hands that danced upon the frets
And keys, now cupped around the Zippo’s flame,
Are stilled completely till one gets
A light, and stepping up another plays the game.
Our shivering village, miming Lowry’s easel
Smears ice-tipped chimney smoke across each neighbour,
And dancing to the double-decker’s diesel
We cough our way to new symphonic labour.
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Stephen A. Linstead
Picture Picasso
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