Borders

 

Borders

 

We’ll frame it all in black,

in truth, the only borders available:

a sort of corrugated card,

to staple around the edges,

hide the cracks.

because the music room lacked

the requisite panache,

a cliffhanger, last rites act

from management prior to the visit –

we shrugged, set to,

mundane, but someone has to

and we’re the band, after all.

Printed off all the old images

to slap on the boards as ordered,

sitting pretty and bordered.

And Alex said to me,

apropos of displays and such -

‘Can you remember, a first LP,

that first you bought?’ Well, I could,

duly reddened within,

so great was the sin;

defaulted to one that counted.

Music had come, gone; amounted

to nothing – but your Beatles Red

is indelibly stamped into my head -

from my very first cassette

that spooled itself into brown ribbons

around vicious toothed spindles

and snapped - to the cracked CD

double jewel-cased set sitting

next to Blue and –

above bordered grinning moptops -

two vinyls sleeved by peeling flipbacks.

Can we bear it?

To see us posted

could bring tears – they sound the same

but the bordered man

has long since bleached; faded

into run out groves, jaded.

But Daniella punches my arm,

punctures, pushes me in corners

‘Take up your bass and play!”

she orders.