Football Poets

Another fruitless night for Hammers at Anfield

¶ 1 Leave a comment on verse 1 0 The deja vu mentality
At Anfield, yet never
Felt like singing the blues
For claret and blue
Choristers, resignation
Mapped on their faces
Like the last spots of pink
Of the empire,
West Ham denied by
Nunez’s goal
And to think he might have
Been flaunting an East End
Shirt of honour
Always clinging though on to life
Rafts of hope and yet not
Tonight, sadly but predictably
Another defeat on
Merseyside for
The valiant and valour
Of the plucky and spirited
Hammers devoted hordes
But far from horrendous
A clumsy stumble on the road
We can only wish higher
Plains will be reached
Downcast tonight
And yet this has always
Been the case
The familiar narrative
Of fine margins
A wretched, single goal defeat
Loss, reduced to
What might have been
Not since 2016 and
Before the medieval age
Of 1963 have the Irons
Forged victory at the furnace
Of our delusional dreams
Floating down the Albert dock
Sinking without trace
Soucek, Bowen, sub
Benrahma, Rice
And Scamacca no more
Than those whistling in the wind
Desolate as Stanley Park
At midnight, still as
The peaceful flow of the
River that no longer
Recognised the subdued
Muttering of Blowing
Bubbles
One day, one year
The Hammers will
Indeed
Return from their yearly
Merseyside pilgrimage
With cheerful confections
Of sugar sweet victories
Shall we take bets
As to the next date,
Decade or even century
When the Hammers will
Conquer first night nerves
The hoodoo, the bad vibes
The heavy burdens of
Ominous omens
Liverpool barely breaking sweat
Orchestras in perfect pitch and tone
Magisterial once again
Undeniable, a class above
West Ham sent packing
At Anfield
But the Kop had that
Singular
Premonition, a prior
Knowledge that West
Ham were easy targets
For their ridicule
And derision, tumbling
Down uncontrollably
From the Liverpool
Gallery of the great
And good
They told us before
We should have known
It was never in any doubt
Sounds of euphonious terraces
In musical union, always there
Hammers were warned
Beware of the overwhelming,
All encompassing, majestic
Anfield, swallowing up goals
In pretty patterns of lacework
Bathed in the luxuriant
Waters of another Premier League
Title challenge,
Highly unlikely now
But October is not May
And trophies have yet
To be delivered on any
Podium of our imagining
But West Ham
Head back to East London with
Empty pockets,
Scarred briefly
And bruised again
But dauntless
Carry on forward
Rally towards another
Day in the autumnal sun
Defeated tonight
Yet the show has to go on
West Ham blow your
Bubbles towards
Effervescent destinations
Let the season unfold
Liverpool, poised and ready
To go
West Ham, dropping stitches
And notes, melancholy as
The Upton Park loyalists
Who may have seen this before
The Stratford escutcheon
Stained, threadbare
Torn at the edges
But still upbeat
The London Stadium
Symphony of colour and
Triumphant noise
Now
West Ham go again

29