Icarus @ 59 # 141

Claiming football is poetry may be stretching a point but moments like these are indeed poetic. The sun dropped, dusk turned to night, the floodlights picked out diamond droplets of dew on the grass and grown men celebrated a season of hard work. It harks back to an earlier, pre-computer age which is timeless; these are working men,  making their own way, turning up in another town after a day's work welding, building, fixing, lifting, shifting, recycling and the rest, carrying their own boots, strips and shin pads under their arms; football is a release and an escape and a way of leaving work behind. They don't get paid, they pay to play and yet sitting with them all in the changing room before and after the game you could see how much it all meant to be part of the team. I had to make decisions on their behalf, but the subs didn't mind being on the bench and those who were subbed didn't mind coming off because it was a team effort and they knew we had a plan to win. I am standing on the edge of the picture, proud of every one of them and glad they let me share it,

Perhaps pretending you never saw the eyes

Of grown men of twenty five
Who all followed as you walked...
Or kissed you on the cheek...

So if you don't lose patience with my fumbling around
I'll come up singing for you even when I'm down

where's Lord Byron when you need him for a poem - but then there is Janis Ian...