Countdown…

I remember

Sitting

On my grandfather’s bed,

43 Newark Drive,

as

Countdown

Played-out on the TV.

 

Channel 4

With

Richard

Whiteley

And

Carol

Vorderman.

 

He

Would rapidly calculate the sums

adding,

subtracting, timsing

and dividing

To reach an obscure number;

 

Juggling

Letters to arrive at the

High-scorer.

 

And,

Always,

At four fifty-five

He would write down the conundrum

And switch off the TV.

 

Thereafter

Heading-downstairs

For an early dinner.

 

Scraps of the Daily Record

With

Careful blue lettering*,

Delicate scribbles.

 

The incomplete,

disconnect

between

solution

and

resolution;

 

A limbo –

Suspended

Then;

 

& forevermore.

*Little red and white Ladbroke pens