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Thought we’d give the balls of piss a miss
Not as safe a place as you’d think anyway
No climbing frame claim to fame this
Or subverted regret game to block
What you always say
Just a cage full of balls
Of piss
The other day
Said you’d try the jump
From up on high
I didn’t believe you’d actually do it
Your boisterous boasting arcs towards the big sky
Spectators like clouds
To your proclaimed bullshit
As you steady yourself
To fly
To die
Into the piss-stained pit
The jeers and taunts work their magic on you
I can see
Your eyes light up
Part of me wishes that you do it too
But the rest of me hopes you fuck up
Trembling ripples
Before the queue
Shine In your vanity cup
The older ones push their way to the top
They steal your presumed win
Sinews much older and bolder do pop
And white smiles
And cheers begin
With no fear of the drop
Or broken chin
The sound of cracking can still be heard
From Walthamstow to Finsbury Park
Your forgotten bravado
Now seems absurd
And we pretend
This won’t leave a mark
Glowing screens become quite blurred
As we embark
Why didn’t they ever take it away
Build something less unforgiving
I guess these lessons
And games we play
Are all part of the game of living
We could say that what we lost
That day
Is perhaps a kind of giving
The plastic balls no longer seem
Like such a safe place
No more the alluring bliss
Scarred from afar and with an older face
I remember that park did this
But once again brave silhouettes eternally begin
The race
Into the balls
Of piss
Kev Byrne has worked as a freelance TEFL teacher for 23 years in south Italy. Originally from London, he now works as the Happiness Manager, blogger, and photographer for Pilgrims Teacher Training through the summer months at the University of Kent in the U.K. He has held numerous photography exhibitions/workshops in Puglia in southern Italy and manages 12 photography Flickr groups (10,000 members worldwide). His passions include his three wonderful children, SLA, socializing, teaching, photography, art, comics, and making photography books, too. He can also be found just staring aimlessly out into space from time to time, enjoying the wind, enjoying the light…