I Wanna Go Back
I wanna go back to ninety-three,
Saturday evening – May fifteenth
Just Rosalyn and me
In Mick Byrne’s bar
In Castlebar
Watching on a tiny screen
Niamh Kavanagh singing
“In Your Eyes”
To Eurovision glory
Beating Sonia
Rosalyn tipsy and so was I
Taking sips of black stuff
Twenty to the pint
And cheering every twelve points
As if they were our own
We might not have been in love
But we were in fun
Feckin’ marvellous roistering fun
Rosalyn giggled a lot
Drank rum chasers and
Rolled joints with
Zig-Zag papers.
She wore a Turkish hat
And had the look about her
Of a startled fawn.
We sat up close
Squeezed arms and thighs
Shared crazy thoughts and laughed
And sometimes kissed
It was unsaid, but understood
We’d make love later in the van
I wanna return to ninety-three
I wanna see Roz again
We were glad to be alive back then.
Easter nineteen ninety-four
Camping at the Cliffs of Moher
From the Twelve Bens of Connemara
To the tip of County Clare
The views were spectacular
And Rosalyn saw Kerry
It was out of sight to me.
She sat by the campfire brooding
Gazing at flames and the moon
Conducting shapes in the air
Doloroso
With a glowing stick
Or walked to the cliff top
Harmonising her breathing
With Atlantic crashing
“Mind the edge there. It’s a long way down.”
“I won’t go over by mistake.”
It was a dark rum night of
Dark night thoughts
She stared into my face
Lifting the cover
Of my mask of innocence – and asked
“Can I trust you?”
I took a long slug and lied,
“You know you can.”
“You will betray me – it’s in your eyes.”
I would too, betray her,
I would not want to
But I would hurt her
Life always went that way.
Her coat lay at the cliff edge
And a scribbled note
Flapped under a shoe,
“You’re good – but just not good enough.”
I have glimpsed her over years
And taken many a stranger’s arm
In city streets
And had to apologise.
I wanna return to ninety-four
Camping at the Cliffs of Moher
I wanna see Roz again
I was glad to be alive back then.
© coolhermit 2023
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You’re a really good story teller. “But we were in fun”. luvverly Albert:-)
Yeah,we had so much fun – Guinness and carousing – but things turned serious – she wanted babies and I already had 7 kids 🙂 Thanks, Albert 🙂
Vivid stuff – glad to have lived a vivd life and lived to tell the vivid tale!