My First Love, 1989 – 91
By Alfie Shoyger
- 2670 reads
I was nine years old when you exploded onto
my road long flaxen hair blue eyes from Kensington,
although you said Hammersmith,
to look less posh.
Either way, the Western side of the Smoke
seemed like a sun-washed island with chandeliers
to this Leyton-oriented meridian-straddler.
Your Mum looked fine too, and in my mind
at first she was your sister. I see her
now and then on her way back from
her gallery, still looking fine eighteen years on.
Your Dad had a voice like the Queen’s park ranger
and fingers that waltzed across the majors
and minors on a fat bald communist’s
comedy show that we quoted and quoted
in between seeing how far we could gob
off playground swings we weren’t allowed on anymore
and dotting fizzy drink cans across the street
for the sweet-tasting crunch of tyre on aluminium
and swearing loudly and ringing on
tower-block doorbells then rushing back into the lift.
My heart skipped the day the lift door started closing
and you squeezed clattering round it.
I thought you’d be sliced in two like Berlin.
Remember when I nearly took your eye out with a dart?
You didn’t even swear loudly at me,
nor I at you when that plastic bottle
crashed into my face.
I’ve still got the scarlet under my nose. No hair
will ever grow there.
Remember when we disguised that edifice of dog-shit
as a mound of torn cardboard?
Qasim’s parents had to buy him new shoes,
and trousers.
Two or three cars needed a wash.
It was love alright.
The iron curtain across my heart was lifting,
but such things were still sick and girly, so
I never dared ask if you
were being likewise amalgamated.
There were no embraces,
no gazes in eyes,
no kisses, no stroking of hair,
no holding of hands or anywhere else,
just a bullet in the heart
when you discovered American cartoons
and the football-team boys.
They talked the talk, walked the walk,
had silky skills, while I couldn’t kick a ball
without spooning it onto a roof
or into a thorn-bush or a big old lady’s garden.
You even started speaking like your Jamaican friends,
while most of mine were Gandhi’s children.
You left one world for another when you became top scorer
and started using words like ‘raasclaat’
and ‘batty-mans’.
I lost you forever then.
Sometimes I still feel this,
even though nowadays
we both tend to love girls instead.
From “Disoccidented” by Alfie Shoyger:
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Disoccidented-Alfie-Shoyger/dp/1999922859
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Comments
Took me a couple of reads to
Took me a couple of reads to get what this is about, because the last line stopped it being the obvious. I liked the bit about the poo, could imagine your delight. Deceptively light hearted description of something which would never go the full course because you both changed direction
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The detail in this is
The detail in this is wonderful, that's why it's our Facebook and Twitter Pick of the Day
Please share/retweet if you enjoyed it as much as I did
ps Alfie, we always put a photo on our picks - please feel free to change it if you don't like the one I found - good luck with your book!
Picture Credit:https://tinyurl.com/ybsw2swz
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Simply lovely. I can imagine
Simply lovely. I can imagine someone reciting this with a wry smile, and reminded me how nice it is to rest on memories, to let them hold you for a while. Thanks for articulating that emotion within me.
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Gorgeous writing. Dropped at
Gorgeous writing. Dropped at the end of each line just at the right time. Meanders but doesn’t ramble. Thoroughly enjoyed this.
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A really wonderful poem, in
A really wonderful poem, in content and construction, and it's our Poem of the Week. Congratulations!
Many apologies, Alfie - for some reason the link to this specific page won't work on the Story of the Week blog post, but I've directed people to your profile page, to pick it up from there.
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I've done a bit of tweaking
I've done a bit of tweaking and the link should be ok now
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I like this one, too. The
I like this one, too. The autobiographical thing, maybe? The (what I tend to call) narrative style (though I don't know if it's actually called that). Not form, anyway. I'm at the bottom of a pit when it comes to choosing a format at the moment and have fallen into the "my stuff's bogus" trap. This one gives me a bit of hope. I'm alternating you with Seamus Heaney at the moment. I like the mysterious final line.
Parson Thru
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