We picked out bent rusty nails from last nights fire 
And straightened them out with a brick
We sped down the black path and hammered them into 
The old oak, two by two and two feet apart
We called it 
The Staircase Winding Tree
We could see the rooftops of Braeside School 
Where we wrote our names on soft summer asphalt
We believed we where invisible 
Listening to people passing below 
Unaware of us silent above
We sat on our favourite branches like wooden owls 
We talked of stars and crossbows and girls
We heard whispered conversations and saw a gang 
crossing the stream below
We ‘The Fleeto’ they ‘The Tay’ and never the twain shall meet
We heard them chanting 
“with a bottle and a brick and a corporation stick…”
We crapped ourselves in silence and made a beeline 
To The Drive when they passed on by
We made up a dance in the front room called
The Banana Flop
We made up another under the reservoir waterfall called
Do The Jungle Rock
We saw the bottles and bricks fly again 
So we scarpered up the dirt tracks to The Back
We played Moashy on The Oval 
With our brasso polished vintage coins 
Hoping to win a Vicky
We dropped into The Devils Garden 
And watched a cat eating it’s young
We blasted our minds on youth and searched for Cidona up by the Mitchell Hill flats
We fought like brothers and cried after the fight and didn’t talk til the end of Six Man Hunt
We heard our Ma’s shout down
“It’s time to come up! It’s gettin’ dark!”
We called back: 
‘Aw! Ma! 5ive more minutes!’ 
“Make sure it is then!”
The double thud from the closing windows, echoed around the night street
like two exclamation marks
We talked of the stars again and wondered 
Where the night plane was going
We parted 
“See you tomorrow after school!”
We jumped up The Close, three steps at a time
We had our own lucky numbers
We had our own den
We had what makes life sparkle in the end: 
Friendship

“Cellar ceiling,
We wrote our candle names.
What a feeling,
Sweet youth beneath the flames”