I remember the humiliation
Of Arthur Crossan
Imposed by Miss Kirkbride
In Infant One -
Him stood in the corner,
A dummy in his mouth
- An insult.
In Junior 4, my coin collection went missing.
Arthur Crossan was the culprit.
A kid from the Catholic Rescue,
With no mother or father,
And raised by the nuns.
Who could blame him?
*****
Of all the boys at St Catherine's School
I remember most fondly Gobbo,
Whose Dad was a milkman and whose face was so sad
- He wasn't bright and the world perplexed him -
That I wished to protect him,
A sort of fellow-feeling,
Me being as cropped-haired and thick-looking as him.