Unhinged

by John Smallshaw
(London, England)

A story as of yet untold
a tale that's waiting to unfold.

Inside the bubble where I was born and grew,
that few if any know about
the skin that wrapped me from within
without a wrinkle now begins
to scrape against my bottom jaw.
The torque that kept me wrapped inside
unravels as I slide outside
The bubble bursts and opens wide.

A scream that rasps against those broken hasps but I'm alive.
I'm out not in the skin that kept me as I slept
in dreams that kept me washed and bathed me.
In minimum I hum a tune
born too soon, too late
It's just another state of mind or is it just the tuning fork?
The torque that doesn't talk
The baby walker that cannot walk alone.
The Rosetta stone could tell another tale
a Holy grail?

one more sentence
one more line
one more minute of your time
and I will pay the ferryman his due.
Two for one and one life gone as one waits in the wings
The waiter waits and sings this song
but we're not here for very long so I guess it doesn't matter.

Pitter patter tiny feet
I raise my eyes
look up to meet
my Father looking down on me.
Maternity
Motherhood
it must be good, look what they've got
A little snot nosed baby boy
the joy of it.

I sit again and listen to the band that plays on Bank Holidays
and Saturdays excluding the first Saturday in Lent.
And I get older
bent.
Intent on living for at least as long
as the waiter in the backroom sings the same old story from the same old song.
But getting longer in the tooth
the truth is
It's all the same to me
I've seen and done it all
Had a ball
some revelry,
Devilry.
Peculiar I maybe
A baby I am not
that snot nosed kid left years ago.