I Want To Be You – Nick Wadham

Ducking and diving feet nimble and quick

Paul Molton’s feet moved like lightning

football skills

slicker than slick

                                       How I want to be you

Always the joker, you made every one laugh

Girls gaze admiringly

In their rapture

you bask

                                        How I want to be you

Alone in the playground, un-noticed, un-heard

While friendship surrounds you

Thinking I was absurd

                                         How I want to be you

Caught in the corner

Here we go again

Taunting teasing tormenting

Molton’s fist flew in with its cargo of pain

                                          Do I want to be you?

So it was thus for a number of years

My school daze fazed punctuated by regular tears

The threat of your wrath almost always was near

Ten years have passed

Since I walked through the gates last

A man of position am I now

With the sweat of a day’s work gleaming on my brow

Thoughts of my wife and children cheer me now

On my way home

               Got any spare change mate?

                                 A pitiful voice at my left foot sighs

                             I look to the dishevelled and stinking tramp

               My generous hand caught in a trap

As I finger a penny a mist of recognition clears his eyes

                It spreads to me too

                              My hand exits

                                                                         Empty

Quick as a snap!

Oh beautiful providence shines down you see

Paul Molton

                                  Don’t you wish you were me!

Nick Wadham 1999