Young Vistas

Young Vistas 

i.

A modded Morris Minor
holds up three silhouettes.
The three are teenagers
if they hit a tree, but hotrodders
until they do. They talk
the torque, gesticulate
about the gears, and drive off
into the unnoticed sunset.
 

ii.

Enclosed within a heritage forest,
a boundary wall, a giant’s library
and a collective hangover, 

a class of boys is warned
of the peril of mixed metaphors,
how the effects can ruin one’s rhetoric. 

Later in the dorms a line
is written for Hermes: ‘your wings are wings’.

iii.

We peel potatoes and know
that we are good boys. The peel
is nothing like the removal
of a dress. The catching of a dress
against the oven door is not at all
like the removal of a dress. 

After lunch a woman punches stodgy chords
at the upright piano and we sing about Babel.

iv. 

The whole terrace heaves
and breathes its pie-mined breath.
The home team feels the warmth. 

There are those who can see the game,
others contented not to. Atop the architecture
of his uncle’s arms, a lad lambasts the lazy striker, 

ready to change places at the kick of a ball.