ST GEORGE'S ROAD 1956

[dadio]

And he said
I’m going to
bust your nose
and I said

you and whose army?
And he said
I don't need no army
with you Benny Coles

I could take you
with one arm
tied behind my back
take your glasses off

I said
then you'll see
just the one me
and did he?

Janice asks
no he threw a punch
but he missed
and I caught him

a left to his right ear
and he folded up
like an old tent
she laughs

shouldn't laugh really
Gran said fighting is brutal
and so lower class
but you make it

sound funny
his glasses fell off
and he couldn't see
to find them

so I picked them up
for him
and he put them on
and the wire

behind the ear
was bent
so I straightened it
for him

and he threw a punch
to my head
but caught
my shoulder instead

and so I poked him one
on the chin
and that packed him in
and he walked off

calling me names
but fighting is
a rough thing
she says

I know
I say
I prefer stamp-collecting
or going to the cinema

and seeing cowboy films
but sometimes
a kid's got to do
what a kid's got to do

and she seems impressed
and we walk along
the road from school
to meet her Gran

by the subway
don't tell my Gran
she says
sure I won't
I say no way.

[the mingo]

[dadio]

[Doreen Peri]

*applause* ... great narrative work, Terry! .... You took me there. I saw the fight. Too many good lines to quote... We've missed you around here.

[dadio]

Thank you, Doreen