Keith D Trestrail Poet Lyric

Notes About The Poem

Note: pic is of my 6th Form class 1977. That’s me middle of middle row.

Dedicated to Steve and Bruce who attended with me at the Mon Desir Hotel 
in Auckland NZ in 1990.

Listen to poem:

Rangitoto College Reunion

                           
Hearken back to the old rule nazis how
  Deputy Fuhrer Hart led assembly -
with his bell, megaphone and monobrow
  it was more like a Hitler Youth Rally!
And Commandant Lomas, old Purple Haze,
  the Grand Inquisitor in my school days.
                          
The bells of Rangitoto ring once more
  for all you inmates of its cellblock walls,
when we did our time and prison greys wore
  and sat its desk rows and rattled its halls.
Across the barroom of the Mon Desir
  old tales of raging hormones filled the air.
                          
To meet again my accidental peers
  and once again that age of youth relive,
who, post the rage of corduroys and flares,
  revisit past sins only time forgive.
Well hey! For old time’s sake I was thinkin’
  prep the bowl…it’s time for a bogwashin’!
                          
Yet forgotten names in a guestbook scrolled
  sadly are not spared life’s mortal complaints,
and for every life story that was told
  I heard tales from the lepers and the saints.
Some met with a smile and some I pass by -
  a “class of” roll call of past alumni.
                      
In uniform blackboards and walls closed in
  smoking weed in a funk getting higher,
when fools rolling a zig-zag ultra thin 
  down in smokers alley lit a bushfire.
For each scoundrel rebel yell and jackass
  to you I filled and gladly raised my glass.
                           
My magnetic petty crimes returned forth
  when fingers did in my direction point,
yet my compass follows its own true north
  and I stepped outside to smoke a fat joint!
But still in the spin of webs and true lies
  some I forgot and some I recognise.
                           
In her spell on the tangled vine I sought
  its forbidden fruit and bittersweet wine -
I learnt fast that which is truly untaught
  has a beckoning smile and lips devine.
Far more than a quest for knowledge I see
  was the pursuit of teen desire in me.
                          
First pashing kiss that does a lifetime keep
  and broken hearts conned by expectations,
the life and love lessons that cut so deep
  quickly learning of our limitations.
All that angst and spirit of innocence 
  was just youthful cognitive dissonance.
                             
The roll call of thirteen years continues
  and ends where the Lord of the Flies began.
Who among you would that time again choose
  and who stands before me a better man?
Oh, but me being me the more I drank
  the more it seemed a sentimental wank.
                             
I care not for any pseudo bullsh*t
  nor a schooled pretender’s futile disguise.
And yet with all I have, my charm and wit,
  with old friend and crush I did fraternise.
Not one of you roused me to greater heights
  but for the P.E. girls in their gym tights!


            Written: November 1990

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