Tag: getting older

The Old Machinery

As young men, we ran through this town
chasing the madness
at the bottom of every bottle
and the warmth of teenage smiles
honeyed with the promise
of new experience

Spinning from bar to bar, pushing the limits
of our bodies capacity for self-destruction
and regeneration
snow melting from our clothes
as we sat and drank and laughed
in the Christmas evening air

Tonight, we’re trying to revive that old machinery
lubricating our shared memories
speaking in the antiquated language
of past experience
trying to reverse
the hands around the clock face

We were young men then
now, we’re something else
there’s less of us left
The barest of bones and dust
well dressed skeletons
if we squint when we look

Those times echo in the canyon between
that ‘then’ and this ‘now’ 
but I don’t have the constitution to return
I’ll always treasure those precious
fizzy memories
but I can’t restart that old machinery…

[2023]

Thanks for reading.

Tan Hill Inn

Teenagers, cycling across the Dales
up country roads in the seventies sun
wheels turning, chests burning
on our way to Tan Hill Inn

Too young to drink then
we’d sit in the garden
catch our breath and if we’re lucky
maybe the northern lights
I’d take photographs
thinking to myself
one day I’ll bring my wife here
one day I’ll bring my children
if I have any
and we’d cycle home

All the energy I had then
all that drive to ride the Pennine Road
on the longest and the shortest days
sit by that fire, dripping dry
seemed there could never be a time
I couldn’t call my friends and ride
up to Tan Hill Inn
skidding home in the snow

I thought it all was endless
it all seemed so endless then

Now my kids are grown
my kids are having their own
there’s no energy left
not in these bones
to cycle up those hills
just to sit
without drinking…

[2017]

Thanks for reading.

Listen to my poems on Soundcloud