Girl With One Track Mind (Sexhunters)
I Fell in Love on the Northern Line
Jack Dove: Canto I
(i)
In humble style I start this tale,
From a time when pop was young,
Love was free; hearty and hale,
I believe The Beatles had just begun,
Hope was that peace couldn't fail,
Nights were groovy, spaced-out fun,
Britain shook when Profumo quit
after stroking Christine Keeler's wit!
(ii)
This time begat our story's hero,
In the heartland of t' North!
Snow under foot, temperature zero,
Near a foundry that would a giant dwarf,
In a council house nestled our hero
To Mother's buxom by roaring hearth
Whilst the window grew an icicle,
And Father buffed his gas board bicycle!
(iii)
His parents - the Doves - called him Jack,
Their son grew fast and strong,
For nothing worldly did he lack,
Whilst his Mutti for her homeland longed,
And Father worked his hands till black,
So was absent when Jack his cot pranged,
Breaking his arm tumbling down the stairs,
Bringing forth his Mother's tears.
(iv)
In time, south they moved to Oxen-Ford,
A town renowned for Dreaming Spires,
Where with wit young minds were scored
To the screech of screaming tyres,
And the good and great applaud
The genius and cant of donnish squires,
They settled near an ancient college
To be rubbed up in The Knowledge.
(v)
That hall Blackfriars had long been named,
A citadel of Catholic learning,
For its liberal views it was famed
With sermons that'd've Papal ears burning,
Many a reactionary had it changed,
And still the world kept turning,
In its cloisters truth and faith found union
As Father Geoffrey schooled Jack for First Communion.
(vi)
Whilst at school not all was well,
Every day saw our hero in tears,
He simply could not learn to spell,
School reports filled his folks with fears
That their darling was as thick as hell,
And shamefully backward for his years,
To his shame Jack could not write,
He could not tell his left from right.
(vii)
To wondrous Wessex his family migrated,
Jack's dad found a gas board by the sea,
Mother a maths degree instigated,
And their summers were happy and free,
But the bullies Jack's studies frustrated,
A bright future he could not see,
Jack Dove flunked his Eleven-Plus,
His Verbal Reasoning wa'n't good enough.
(viii)
To Secondary Modern he was sent,
Jack boy didn't like the look of it,
And toiling with passion heaven sent,
He thrived and won an early exit,
Where bigger bullies rent
With domestic rage did him hit,
More miserable could not have been Jack's plight,
If he'd been fried in canine shite.
(ix)
Out of school it was not so bad,
He was befriended by a yachtsman,
Working on board Jack felt less sad
And even acquired a Poole fisherman's tan,
Though sometimes life got rather mad
With scraps worthy of Desperate Dan,
The line with death could not have been finer
When they rammed a French truckliner.
(x)
But in the classroom fear never left Jack,
Fists and needles made learning grim,
His sensitive head took many a thwack,
He felt he could not hit back; couldn't win,
Then a thug another boy attacked
With a dissection blade, near killed his victim,
From that day irrational fear ruled Jack's head,
And would never quit ere he was dead.
(xi)
The danger receded, yet his terror grew,
Once he'd been beaten by a boy named Cockman,
Now in Jack's mind blades slashed and fists flew,
His imagination was white hot, man!
Irrational fears he could not eschew,
Sometimes he sweated, sometimes he ran,
Yet he laughed in the face of adversity
And made it through to university.
(xii)
His new-found freedom pleased young Jack,
He stayed up late and drank to excess,
Yet he couldn't get a girl into the sack,
For Jack a foreign land was sex,
His chat-up lines were, alas, alack,
In this department I'd say less is less,
Until an older woman to him took a shine,
dragged Jack home and tupped him thirteen times.