All blond curls and blur of blue velvet shorts
tilting arms splayed and plasticine legs bent
balancing along the bombsite wall, intrepid.

There was a difference between him and me
not like plastic cups and porcelain
rather a faint aura of all the things he’d become
and all the things I’d fail to be.

Behind him was a semi-detached
loving parents the perfect match.
Behind me was a block of flats
preoccupied parents and “don’t-do-that!”

I remember Vivien and the dying light the broken glass
the stones we threw and the shadowy oncoming night
and his mother’s call, “Come Vivien, we’re off on holiday
tomorrow and it’s time for your bath.”

Then the sense of vacancy when he had gone
the empty bombsite the broken wall cat noise and dog poo
the evening mauve damp street lights grew and there on
the spot where he had trod was his shoe pattern tread.

I remember the moment he left and the nasty clinging class
thing growing in my head.