You never see a housewife in the bookies

One a mans greatest failings

So often, the easiest way in is the hardest way out

Never quite a solution found in anything other

Than making sure there onto a winner

A man’s clammy hands and unquestionable urge

Is to see the doors open

Smell the chintz and stale smoke and sit quietly

Making notes

Then curse things to others that seem unsightly

But to him it’s the serpents in the walls

When he steps outside

That quells his doubts and heeds his calls

Type digits and pray that he’ll go back

And stay until 3.40 and the odds are stacked

 

They break, hustle and sprint

Into the corners, whispers and tension sit pregnant in the air

Some dart with urgency and others sit back

Paper sits deeper into a man’s grasp

While three hit the front

Desperately lunging, carrying the weight of a man’s punt

Inching past the middle

There’s a frenzy at the tables

That won’t rest until the stables

And the beats get quicker, the whips more frequent

Battling past the third in front

Oh to be the man with that golden touch

Gawping at a telly as he strides into range

With ten to go, he drops his pace

Throttled in a corner, nestled back in fourth

That’s his final resting place

 

So it subsides and the rain niggles away

The bus lights show as they approach

There’s pence left from the day

He winces through the smears in cold windows

And curses his urge to go and play

Steps through the door and says nothing

His night was spent with quiet pints with friends where they spoke of everything

 

Those cold sweats

And that age old debt

Means nothing to his wife

This is his worry and his life

 

The serpents are circling and they can’t wait no more

Their staying ten feet away, and resting by his door