Left to right: Tom Lyford & Steve Taylor
GOOD OL' BOYS
Sprung from the maternity ward on or about
the same day, blood-brothers cursed with
good ol’ boys’ curiosities, just a natural-born
Frank and Jesse James gang of two, our first
heists being valve-stem caps off the tires of
idling cars parked out front of Bob Roberts’
Grocery only because they were there, I guess,
and something we could reach… our trikes
growing into bikes with horses’ names, and
later developing into Harleys engined by aces
of spades clothes-pinned right into the spokes
flacketty-rackettywhack!
Short and invisible to adults in the fall of ’58…
slipping under the radar through the gala open-
house crowd in the back of the Dover Motor
Chevrolet showroom and brazenly peeking up the
canvas skirt shrouding the about-to-be-unveiled
Car of the Future, us becoming the absolute first
human beings on the planet to eyeball the
Oh-My-God, drop-dead super fins of the ’59…!
Purple Heart veterans of the Merrick Square Pea-
shooter Campaign of the early ‘60s that escalated
into savage backyard guerilla warfare where
the weapon of choice was the apple-grenade
speared onto the sharp tip of a limbed sapling
and propelled with a quick fierce whip-snap!
And always looking to the likes of Bogart
and Cagney for what to say and how to say it,
or how to smoke those
stolen ashtray butts…
wondering about S-E-X…
and itching to get older...
Sprung from the maternity ward on or about
the same day, blood-brothers cursed with
good ol’ boys’ curiosities, just a natural-born
Frank and Jesse James gang of two, our first
heists being valve-stem caps off the tires of
idling cars parked out front of Bob Roberts’
Grocery only because they were there, I guess,
and something we could reach… our trikes
growing into bikes with horses’ names, and
later developing into Harleys engined by aces
of spades clothes-pinned right into the spokes
flacketty-rackettywhack!
Short and invisible to adults in the fall of ’58…
slipping under the radar through the gala open-
house crowd in the back of the Dover Motor
Chevrolet showroom and brazenly peeking up the
canvas skirt shrouding the about-to-be-unveiled
Car of the Future, us becoming the absolute first
human beings on the planet to eyeball the
Oh-My-God, drop-dead super fins of the ’59…!
Purple Heart veterans of the Merrick Square Pea-
shooter Campaign of the early ‘60s that escalated
into savage backyard guerilla warfare where
the weapon of choice was the apple-grenade
speared onto the sharp tip of a limbed sapling
and propelled with a quick fierce whip-snap!
And always looking to the likes of Bogart
and Cagney for what to say and how to say it,
or how to smoke those
stolen ashtray butts…
wondering about S-E-X…
and itching to get older...
