Friday, 26 November 2021

Now and Then


I am wondering how rock’n’roll

this Brummie rock’n’roll bar is

when the barman passes me

my bottle of apple and mango J2O

 

and moves on to the next punter

without such much as a whisper

of the word ‘glass’.

Ah, that rock’n’roll.

 

As I ponder what might have happened

had I ordered a Jack Daniel’s,

 

I watch the first in a triumvirate 

of hardcore beatdown bands

whose earnest endeavour

it is to redefine the word loud.

 

The new loud leaves eleven stranded

in a mosh pit with vaporised ear drums,

as it travels towards the outer reaches

of infinity.

 

The audience-mob responds

by beating to a pulp

the spaces in between them (mainly).

Blurry, amphetamine, windmill arms flail,

like a 1984 Morrissey on fast forward,

and a small army of boots stamp

on what I am convinced

 

must be some form of fire,

invisible to my tired, middle-aged eyes.

 

Courtesy of a text from an old band mate,

my mind rewinds to the brief rock’n’roll adventures

of my own youth.

 

Ah, how charmingly jejune we were

back in the day

when we tried to conjure up

such a thing as melody

 

and drank whisky

from a bottle.

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