A Man Without A Team: The Poetry In It All

Well, the latest game was a 3-2 loss against one of the ostensibly worst teams in the league my former club shouldn't be, but are, in.

The first game's five-goal haul seems a long way away.

I didn't go; it was never really a possibility to be honest.

I mean, I'd have liked to have seen the comrades - of course. But Friday Night Footy's always weird and wrecks the weekend rhythm, specially when it's a bank holiday. Funnily enough, it was nearly the case that I moved to the home of my former club's latest conquerors, Denbigh Town to be exact. It was a work thing, and I was kind of excited at the possibility of watching regular footy. Not as a supporter of Denbigh; but to fill the hole where my club used to be. Sort of a rebound relationship based on shagging, but strictly no love.

I was never good at those either.

And as it turned out, we didn't move there. What I did get from the experience is that it's a bit of a pain in the arse to get to from this direction. Surprisingly long drive, considering it's not that many miles away.

Anyway, I didn't go, but I did sneak some looks at Denbigh's Twitter feed. The former club's feed is shit these days; last season, it was basically minute-by-minute and worth keeping tabs on. We also had Radio Bangor, too.

All gone now; volunteers discouraged, disillusioned and departed from their roles. There's only a few characters running things now; we're not sure what some of them actually do, either. Aside from build up hours in various tax/business/court hearings.

So we lost 3-2. (Hey. I said 'we'. I'm not gonna correct it. It shows I'm still trying to disconnect.)

And something strange but inevitable happened: a kind of backlash, a knee-jerk roar of discontent revealed itself on message boards.

Now, following in the footsteps of various found media-poets including - possibly most visibly - Dave Gorman on telly, I've written Below the Line Poetry at various times. Here's a session I did with Neil Crud for his radio show on Tudno FM, where I culled various comments from articles about Jeremy Corbyn's win of the Labour Leadership in 2016:Click here for the whole show and the session too. (Props to Neil for the ace music he created underneath the words.)

Below the Line Poetry is all about bringing together actual responses to online articles, (Russian spambots aside) by real people, commenting on stories in the press. And it is a scary place. The inside of some people's heads is an intense wasteland of half-formed thoughts, filthy aggression and crazed rambling paranoia. And, obviously, this is a great source of material for poems isn't it.

I was reminded of Below the Line Poetry by the lively message boards last night and this morning, and so here's a quick poem based on the loss of my former club to a team bravado and delusion and hubris dictated that nobody expected us to do anything aside from swat away by four or five goals. These are all genuine comments from Bangor City fans online, and thus it is their work.


Puppets and Muppets

What happened to the 5-0 backlash win?

Spineless.
Clueless.
Heartless.
Rudderless.
It's enough to make you weep.

Financial doping?
Finance dopes more like.
Bookies are getting caned with all these shock defeats.
Sad face/Angry face
Lowest of the low.
Horrible cunts that are destroying our club.

Puppets and muppets, someone once said.
I give it a month, these clowns will be off;
they said it was going to be easy...
Arrogant tourists from another planet.

Be patient grasshopper,
A fox will hunt during the stillness of the night.