I wish I was 15 again

with my flares, long hair

No cares just free

playing with the American kids in the fields

loving their hippie style

the girls were so cool

my sister climbing out her bedroom window

to smoke grass with her boyfriend

she was so pretty, so crazy!

 

I would ride my chopper bike for miles

deep into the country underneath such blue skies

while US fighter bombers flew overhead

pretending I was in Vietnam

thought I was John Wayne

but I was just me – trying to find a reason

I had so many dreams

so much hope that I would find the right path

 

Dancing with girls at school discos

the smell of Brut and mothballs

Playing in goal for the school team

they say keepers are mad!

listening to Neil Young

wishing I was him

boasting about football match violence on Saturdays

when really, I ran away

Especially against Spurs!

 

Drinking in the local pubs

Dad taking 12 strangers out to dinner!

Looking at my brother – he got all the girls

Mum dressed up tonight like Elizabeth Taylor!

 

It’s 1974 all my problems are way ahead of me

just to go back for one night

to see Michael Kelly

Who said today we’re all young Boys

one day we will all be old men!

Oh! How right he was…

 

Sam who always wore his vest over his orange nylon shirt…

we all Loved Amanda Tombs

kissing our pillows each night

those days are no more

yet they remain forever in my heart

like an eternal pearl trapped inside an oyster

in the depths of the deepest sea

 

M C Bolton June 2020

@MarkCBolton1