Gypsey Music

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Brendan Ward
Tags: Poetry

I came home last night
smelling of cigarettes and beer,
of a dingy pub and club
with dirty toilets, heavy air
and a middle-aged woman
trying to be twenty for a night
(for a kiss).

It was hot as a factory
or a sordid city
in the centre of a crowd
that banged their heads
and thrashed their hair
and stank of sweat,
and cigarettes.

Yet that song (that voice!)
rippled my skin with goosebumps
and lifted me up on wings
made of notes and harmony,
beating with the thump, thump
of the drums as they pumped.

I came home last night
dreaming, despite the stench
of cities and money;
dreaming of rain in Africa.