In late Nineteen eighty two

i was feeling very frail.

And on this occasion

went a bit off the rails.

 

Not really knowing

Who I am

I took myself off

To Amsterdam.

 

There I met a mate

Who was a little bit gone

Always called himself

by the name of Mad John.

 

He set me up there

with a nice little number.

Something to do,

A nice little number.

 

It was looking out

for the people in need.

And selling them

a little wrap of speed.

 

My partner was welsh

and definitely mad.

Truth to be told

I was just as bad.

 

We were never gonna be rich.

Just drink and drugs and rock and roll.

And a little bit of sex 

to lighten the mood,

every now and then

a bit food.

 

My speciality was 

the English tourist.

There looking for thrills

And other 

 

exploitational often perverse means of taking advantage of poorer people by using the power of money to exploit the poorest suffering masses who exist in an unrecorded sub class of internationally aware middle class western society even then with poorer immigrants as, usually, the unwilling victims. 

 

So I ripped them off

Nothing noble

Nothing free

Just a five quid deal

Worth three.

 

But Mad John

had to.

I asked him 

not to,

But he had to.

 

So he went and dealt

Our speciality ware

In someone else’s pub.

Broke an unwritten rule

I nearly went spare.

 

Next thing I knew

It happened so quick

Mad Johns face

Carved like a stick.

 

And with the cuts

a message sent not by text

Your his mate so 

that makes you next.

 

With a little thought

I said goodbye

To all my friends I’d

Met on the fly.

 

Dave the Canadian pimp,

His four girls from Leeds.

Who I’d helped 

in a body guard manner

As they plied their trade

In the posh hotels Amsterdammer.

 

And Nosh and Cath

Who owned the bar

The lovely old Swan

Where we sat and planned

our glowing futures.

And sometimes slept.

 

So on the ferry

Back I skived

No better off

Then when I arrived.

 

But another corner turned

Big lesson learnt.

The wisdom that burned.

This time I’d gone.

If yer gonna do business

Don’t pick Mad John.