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Addled Stop

Edward Thomas

Thursday, August 2nd, 2001

1 Leave a comment on verse 1 0 Yes, I remember the addled stop,
The save, because one afternoon
Of sleet, the goalkeeper saved a shot
Unwontedly. There was a full moon.
The steam hissed. The keeper urinated.
No one left and no one came
Behind the goalposts. What I saw
Was an addled stop – only a game.
And brown ale, cider flasks and fags
And Woodbines sweet and whisky dry,
No whit less still and lonely fair
Than the high crosses in the sky.
And for that minute a whistle blew
Close by, the referee mistier,
And farther, whistles blew in all the Sunday Leagues
Of Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire.

Source: http://footballpoets.org/poems/addled-stop/