Poem 286
One more ‘name’ poem … the OE I never had but was perfectly capable of borrowing … and the classic pattern of post-OE expanded minds having to come to terms with less exciting futures following a brief and token struggle …
Paul
When Paul came back from overseas he had these stories there was the one about Amsterdam and the one about going to Studio 54 in New York there was the one about selling dollars on the black market in Venice and having to swim for it and one I particularly liked about riding around with the drugs dealer in Colorado who turned out to be the sheriff a week after he got back Paul said he was going to the South Island and went gotta move by the time he reappeared I'd told just about everyone his stories with the accents and all I introduced him at parties by saying and here's the man himself Paul said this south pacific jewel of ours was a dump then looked distant then got married and did a lot of concreting I rarely tell his stories now but when I'm on a real beach a flat blue drop of ocean to the horizon with no islands I sometimes catch myself thinking I've got to get back to Colorado