Of Time and the City Page #2

As I struggled with

my adolescent desires,

as I waited at the top of the aisle,

as the wrestlers swaggered up

from the ring,

their trunks tight across the buttocks,

I could feel their body heat

as I furtively touched a back or a thigh,

choking with schoolboy guilt

and trembling with the fear

of the wrath of God.

Oh, save me from those dark desires

which thrill and compel.

The world. The flesh.

And the Devil.

(Bell rings)

(# Male voice sings Perotin's

Beata Viscera)

Caught between Canon

and the criminal law,

I said goodbye to my girlhood.

Here, I wept...

...wept and prayed until my knees bled,

but no succour came -

no peace granted.

Here was my whole world.

Home. School. The Movies.

And God.

You, who damn but give no comfort.

Why do I plead?

Why do you not respond, angel eyes?

Jesus, mercy. Mary, help.

Lull me to safety.

(# Plainsong continues... )

Between sleeping and waking,

Earth does not revolve.

And slow turns the life

of meagre timbre,

of dullest breath.

Between birth and dying,

some lovely moments grow.

And sorrows not known until tomorrow,

cloud the happy hours

spent dreaming in the sun.

Between joy and consolation,

no easy path.

Some flights of fancy,

some colour.

Glorious old Hollywood;

small, comic England.

Black and white.

Between loving and hating,

the real journey starts.

Let go the latter, embrace the former,

then fall to heaven on a gentle smile.

Between waking and sleeping,

the earth resumes its turn.

The soft light fills the room,

the nightly demons perish from the bed,

and all humanity braves another day.

(Archive recording of woman)

'We used to help one another out.

'Go to wash house.

'Do washing for anyone if they couldn't,

'or nurse them if they were sick.'

Those are all right,

but yours still smell of smoke!

'And then, of course,

my mother died on Christmas Eve.

'And she left me at fourteen

'with a little baby, twelve months old,

'and another one, er, four.

'Me dad stayed with us

eight weeks.

'And then he got a ship,

and went away and left us.

'Course, he died after, you know.

'Then I had more trouble

on me plate, like.

'Me husband never ever

got much work.

'I had to work all me life.

'But thank God! God's been very good

to me. And his Holy Mother.

(Bell chimes)

(# The Spinners:
Dirty Old Town)

# I found my love

# By the gas works croft

# Dreamed a dream

# By the old canal

# Kissed my girl

# By the factory wall

# Dirty old town

# Dirty old town

# I heard a siren

# From the dock

# Saw a train

# Set the night on fire

# Smelled the spring

# On the sulphured wind

# Dirty old town

# Dirty old town #

The year moves towards November.

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