Football Poets

What marker can we place
at the limits of this day?
Whose anti-face or sterile glance
will transmute the fourth official’s
only chance at peace
to futile bargaining?

Which water bottles will survive
the marginal […]

Border territ’ry
neighbours far from breaking bad
heads further south

Super Eagles pass
high up above the ‘happy
to be here’ sea.

In Eastern Europe
a City boy boards a plane-
history again

No summer […]

On the Côte d’Ivoire
Les Éléphants hope for more
than the Group Stage

The stars were trodden down
in an atrium of enclosed sound.

There’s a tribute to Big Sam
on the floor of Middlebrook Boulevard
where dignitaries illumine stars
for shoppers then to walk upon.

I’ve been to Bolton […]

In Westbourne Grove with Don and Stan
playing games we had no poker face for,
opening tears in space and time
for Clement and Gillard to make their runs from
when The Great West Road led to total football.

A […]

Agricultural football in strange formations:
right back in the centre, youth team player
lone striker. Between genius and madness
is a fine line of nine central defenders

over which you tread and re-tread, […]

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A May river path
through Bishop’s Park enduring
South West Six music

Smoke drifts from benches
while kids throw stones to water
no thought of trouble

Cantus Firmus, Haynes,
Morgan, Chamberlain, […]

Between Shore Road and Branksome Chine,
beneath the beach huts of Canford Cliffs,
is an international football pitch
with a ghost ship’s cargo from Shanklin

Yellow posts, memories of Small Hope Beach,
Hawkins’ […]

Last game he saw was Norwich at home,
August 15th. Reckon he’d ‘vibed out’
mentally, found other interests, disconnected

Took pictures of his kittens, cycled
and travelled on business, found
a form of […]

When the groundsman rested
from the first autumn freeze,
the mowers were silent
as sun on the leaves

Lines were unpainted
and dads left unabused referees
at home in the kitchen
with a quick cup of tea

When the […]

Mrs Norfolk Jim,
your husband met a Ukrainian
while you were shopping in a ‘fine city.’

He had too much integrity
to impregnate her with more than
footballing wisdom

Penned in before a sea of black and […]

One morning, at Battersea Funfair, I noticed Mike Withers.
He always wore a dark grey tracksuit, whether in the pub
or working, but was usually in Southwark. Normally
he had London Pride, but today was holding […]