Red-Headed

On the warm towpath
I finally took them out
of their sleek seductive case
and admired them.
A bright summer morn’
in the wilderness of the
country, halcyon days, they were;
trying to catch fish.

The bread punches; how
I held them tight in my hand,
feeling their comely nature:
Useful, yet refined.
Since I first saw them
in the fishing tackle shop;
to possess was ambition
for a youthful lad.

One pound, fifty pence!
a fortune for a small boy.
Oh! they sat there on the shelf
their splendour calling.
I truly believed
every angler worth his salt
would own bread punches like these,
with them I could hold

a mature head high
and look so professional
owning my own punches
like every grown up.
Two fingers of steel
designed to push through bread bait.
Their gorgeous utility
would anoint my hooks.

I had scrimped and saved,
finally their brilliance
and radiance were mine:
Shiny, spotless steel.
Like beautiful plump
empty ballpoint pens, I did
not test them when I got home;
they looked so pure.

Tentatively, I
tried them on that fateful day,
disappointed none observed
my prized bread punches.
It was all silent,
maybe a little warm breeze
echoing the wilderness
of that Styx gently.

An aphonic cut
much too country and quiet.
Alone, I took out the bread
in trepidation.
To my surprise and
astonishment, they failed!
I could have done better
with my own fingers.

All that hankering
covetousness just for a
shiny desideratum
that tantalised me.
Now I am adult
whenever I hunger;
the lesson of the bread punch
reminds me to stop.






A bread punch is a device anglers use to stamp out pieces of bread used as bait in Course fishing. A 'cut' is (British) English slang for a man-made canal.