Felix Dennis

(off the M1, 1964)

Crammed in a van like tinned sardines,
Three in the front and three in the rear,
Our stage shirts on the roadie’s lap,
Fingers tracing the route on the map
With Pete’s harmonica in our ear:
The night is young in Milton Keynes!

Then after the gig, still hyped, half dead,
Half deaf, we help the roadie load,
And flirt with girls: ‘We think yer great!’
(Perhaps we were.) ‘Let’s go. It’s late!’
‘Drop me off at the top of the road.’
‘G’night.’‘G’night.’ And an empty bed.

WEST INDIES, 2006