Football Poets

It’s now or never

¶ 1 Leave a comment on verse 1 0 So here we are England
The day before the
Morning mists welcome
The vicars and bicycles who
Trundle down long forgotten
Country lanes
The post man and woman
Cheerily whistle that
Inevitable victory
For Gareth Southgate’s
11 of the best
It’s now or never
Make or break
Obliterate Denmark,
Serbia and Slovenia
From your mind
This is judgment day
A weekend for nail
Biting, teeth chattering
Hiding behind sofas
And, of course Chesterfield
Now there’s a jolly witticism
Tomorrow’s world though,
It’s time to sit and up
And take notice
No more inquests
Back page investigations
Red top tabloid barbs
Childish nit picking
England, your country needs you
To just win
It’s knockout football
And you’re on
The cameras will be
Monitoring your every breath,
That crucial body language
This is the business end
Of Euro 2024
No more caution or fear
Sunday introspection
The group stage sparring
Is officially over
Time to don those
Decisive shooting boots
Of purple, green or yellow
Polka dot hue
And steamroller over
Slovakia
A country of five point four million
People or so we believe
Land locked between
Poland and Romania
Gareth, it’s a piece of cake
Slovakia, of course
Novices at this level
It can’t be that hard
England, surely not
Another struggle
And survival of the fittest
Let’s topple over this
Minor obstacle
But maybe not
Perhaps it’ll be
Complicated as
The Rubik’s Cube
90 minutes of huffing and puffing
Sweating and seething
Crashing into brick walls
No way through
Oh, England this
Eternal mystery,
Making mountains out of
Molehills
Refrain from these infuriating
Bouts of stage fright
Muddled thinking
On paper it should be
Like picking apples from trees
Simple as the times table
Or the ABC
England
That patchwork quilt
Of chocolate box meadows
And sprawling green fields
A picture postcard
From the village souvenir shop
Tomorrow we ask you kindly
Let’s hit the ground running
Immediately
No time for dithering, dallying,
Stepping on the ball indefinitely
Drawing cropped circles
On that green pasture of land
Of fertile German soil
Take Slovakia to the cleaners
We implore you to be ruthless,
Heartless, cruel to be kind
But for a while just models of
Callousness and brutality
But in a legal way of course
So Declan, Bukayo, Phil, Conor,
Marc and John guarding
At the back
Oh yes and Hey Jude
Take a sad song
And make it better
England’s ingenious inventor
Be ready and prepared
For Sunday services
Of triumphant melodies
Tomorrow our hearts
Will be with you
Unquestionably
We need a performance
Some kind of tune
Where hope springs eternal
And any suggestion
That football may be
Coming home

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