Eddie was always a thin
frayed rope of a child.
Skin groaned under protest
at such a speedy skeletal process
as railway routes were laid
across his back.

 

His mother clucked,
"Eddie owns the neck of  a corpse",

 

I remember his FA cup ears,
wing nuts with little red veins.
His mother flapped, "our Eddies lugs "
and that time he was bitten by a rat
at dusk, she laughed  "it's always you".

 

It always was him, the easy target,
an easy joke, they wore him down,
filled him up with something else
till he didn't give a damn at all.
Eddie died of suicide, abroad somewhere.

 

When they heard a few were still
in their busy day, as if they cared
remembered him, gave a damn at all.