|

Dixie Dean – ‘Footballer To The Queen’

Keith Armstrong

Saturday, June 3rd, 2006

1 Leave a comment on verse 1 0 A leg
you swung and shook and balanced on;
a muscled lever
that launched you
up above the crowds,
like a fresh salmon
leaping for the net,
was hacked off
this afternoon;
severed,
bleeding goals from yesterday.

2 Leave a comment on verse 2 0 Away
from the floodlights,
on the sooty terraces
of retirement,
the careful surgeons
knifed
through,
with a bullet-head,
the baggy and square
defenders of our time.

3 Leave a comment on verse 3 0 Now
they are pickling
the lonely leg,
the explosive boot,
its ankle-pad,
its foot

4 Leave a comment on verse 4 0 swollen with kicks.

5 Leave a comment on verse 5 0 Bottling it up
for the boardroom scene,
labelled:

6 Leave a comment on verse 6 0 DIXIE DEAN – ‘FOOTBALLER TO THE QUEEN’

© ka06

Notes

* Dixie Dean – legendary Everton centre-forward who had his leg amputated

Source: http://footballpoets.org/poems/dixie-dean-footballer-to-the-queen/