Paying For Her Lock Hospital [Early] Discharge With Dead Men’s Shillings

by Paul Tristram / January 24th, 2021

Cantankerous is the morning
… eager for her return,
I turn, surefooted, alley-wards,
to dart, duck and dive
my way uptown to deliver
my hard-earned pocket-stash.
‘Gratitude’ doesn’t sit well
in her ice-blue eyes…
but, she’ll be pleased to see me
for the better part of 5 minutes
… and that’ll bloody do me.
Born too damned pretty, tha ‘un,
pawned gnashers or not…
I’m either staging suicides
to save her, or to bail her out.
I’ve hoisted a whole pork pie
and a flagon of Pale Ale,
for us to share by that oak tree,
like last time, she’ll like ‘at.
Bit of luck, it’s been hard,
and she’s been treated unkindly,
only not too much, like…
which’ll make her needing rest,
and I’ll get a whole night,
with her cruel, selfish heart,
bedded right down by my side.

Paul Tristram is a widely published Welsh writer who deals in the Lowlife, Outsider, and Outlaw genres.  He wrote his first poem as a teenager following his release from the (Infamous) Borstal ‘HMP Portland’, and he has been creating Literary Terrorism ever since.  His novel ‘Crazy Like Emotion’ is available to purchase right here . Also his collection of shorter fiction Kicking Back Drunk ‘Round The Candletree Graves' is available to purchase at https://bookgoodies.com/a/B0DFMTSR4F Both books are published by Close To The Bone Publishing. Read other articles by Paul, or visit Paul's website.

This article was posted on Sunday, January 24th, 2021 at 8:02am and is filed under Poetry.