I used to look at you,

Dozens didn’t,

Rushing by with “too much to do in too little time”-

What an envious life they lived.

You’d listen to their cursing,

Wishing you could trade your ripped cords,

Your vomit-specked sleeping bag,

Your damp trainers,

Your heroin addiction

For their pin stripes,

Their Italian leather,

Their smooth chins,

And their deadlines.

You’d thank them for their ignorance,

Wishing them well for the day.

Some would apologise, “Sorry mate, only notes”

Then walk away from your plight

To the tune of £2.10 in their trousers.

Wasn’t always so bad:

Occasionally, you’d get tossed a copper

From a busy banker on a call from Hong Kong,

Without a look like a sardine to a seal

Whose novelty had worn off at the zoo.

It probably did more for them than you:

Their good deed of the day

And conceited ego-stroke

In the bag before elevenses.

I’d bring you a bacon butty

And a cup of tea, determined

To feed only you and not your habit.

You were grateful. I was moved.

So I’d lean against your living room,

Noting that you’d never request my shoes off,

And listen to your stories,

So wonderfully told given the circumstances.

A gifted illustrator-

I still have the witty strip about you

Giving change to the bankers following the Crunch-

How we laughed.

Nearly a professional cricketer too,

Before a snapped cruciate put paid to that.

You had revealed your knee-

Wrapped in a discarded tea towel to stop

The cold adding insult to injury.

Other times, we simply talked about me.

I didn’t want to complain too much,

Or talk at length about my date next Friday,

Afraid it may offend you.

You insisted it wouldn’t and encouraged me:

Perhaps you felt able to live a slice of life

Through my trite tribulations.

Or maybe you were simply happy for me.

That had continued for a good two years,

When one morning I didn’t see you.

The pin stripes didn’t notice the vacancy in the doorway

But I did. I fed your breakfast to the pigeons that day.

I often wonder where you went.

Did you get saved and housed and move into

Illustrating whilst listening to the Test matches

On the battery radio I gave you?

Or did you trade hope for a bottle,

And with a needle in a collapsed vein,

Follow the empties into the river?

I hope it was the former,

That I’ll see your distinctive style on the Politics page,

That I’ll pass you in the street and won’t recognise your smooth chin.

Until then, I don’t walk the Thames way to work anymore.