Paul Tristram
Unpublishable 2014
Paul Tristram is a Welsh writer who has poems, short stories, sketches and photography published in many publications around the world, he yearns to tattoo porcelain bridesmaids instead of digging empty graves for innocence at midnight, this too may pass, yet.
You can read his poems and stories here!
Juvenile Delinquency Rules OK!
It’s gang warfare here outside,
the grimy streets overfloweth
with bloody teenage angst.
Graffiti decorated neighbourhoods,
each corner, bypass and subway
flies a spray-painted warning sign.
With no respect for the elderly,
the Police or ordinary family folk.
Like night time animal packs
out hunting the back lanes and alleyways.
With pockets stuffed with dangerous toys
and mayhem and violence in our eyes.
Alcohol and substance abuse
add adrenalin and purpose to the mood,
keeping us always edgy and alert.
We are out here in our thousands
laying claim to the wretched night.
The daylight hours are yours only,
stay inside safe and warm
when the shadows lengthen into dark.
We’re not coming for your children,
we are your children!
It’s Better Than A Kick In The Cunt
(As My Dear Old Grandmother Used To Say!)
You’re just going to have to trust me on this one.
A dry garden shed with a door to pull shut
is like a night spent in The Ritz after six nights
of standing up shivering inside your wet clothes
and sleeping bag against the back of a cold factory
wall down the arse-end of a lane to nowhere.
It’s the small things you learn to enjoy,
it’s the little things that breed optimism in you.
Like that afternoon in Newquay when that guy
from St Agnes bored and annoyed everyone
getting ready to scupper down on Fistral Beach.
But you learnt from him to always keep matches
covered in candle wax in your tobacco tin,
since then you have never had a wet match
and that counts more than a pocket full of cash
when it’s 2am in January in a British Winter.
As you lay, at last out of the wind and rain
watching the full moon dancing with the steam
coming off your overcoat and boots which are
hanging up on somewhere other than your body.
And you yawn and stretch in almost contentment
as you light up that first fat roll-up for half a day.