Adam (aged 8)

Befuddled head at breakfast still scoring winning goals,
the day changes colour like the grazes on his knees.

School clock winding him up. Classroom window a broken tv
offering no distraction, save a plane's white scratch across the blue,

lending him temporary wings. Streaking through the school gates,
his winter jacket stuffed into his bag, he ignores his mother's pleas

and pleases himself. At home he is king of his castle protecting his stash of comics,
his cache of sweets, the remote, the plastic waterpistol he got from a party bag.

He is prepared to fight...for the right... to stay up late
He rolls his tongue around 'ffaarrtt' - firing it off in random patterns

Invisible assassins he despatches with chop and kick,fearing no-one,
(except... at night...the ghost that lives down the toilet)

He has alien world's crumbling at his dexterous finger tips
'Til his mother-ship DEMANDS he docks for sausages and chips.