HARD LIVING. by Bradford Middleton

The nights run one into another

Either working

Working

Working, or

Drinking

Drinking

Drinking

The days are spent preparing for either

The thought that this will never end

As I sit here 3 1/2 hours until work calls

Dreaming of my next bout of drinking

The nights

At work are

Fine, dull but

Fine and I don't

Miss that place

That dragged me

Down for so long

That place up the road

Here, the customers

Seem a million miles

Away from where I've come

Rich

10 pound wine for dinner

Lumps of good steak or

Ready meals for their

Short attention lives

Me, I tend to be where

I always was, on the

Tils,

Meeting new people

Whilst teasing the older

Ladies with growing

Reputations of drunkenness.

Bradford Middleton was born in south-east London during the summer of 1971 and won his first poetry prize at the age of nine.  He then gave up writing poems for nearly twenty-five years and it wasn't until he landed in Brighton, knowing no one and having no money, that he began again.  Ten years later and he's been lucky enough to have had a few chapbooks published including a new one from Analog Submission Press entitled 'Flying through this Life like a Bottle Battling Gravity', his debut from Crisis Chronicles Press (Ohio, USA) and his second effort for Holy & Intoxicated Press (Hastings, UK).  He has read around the UK at various bars, venues and festivals and is always keen to get out and read to new crowds.  His poetry has also been or will be published shortly in the Chiron Review, Zygote in my Coffee, Section 8, Razur Cuts, Paper & Ink, Grandma Moses 'Poet to Notice', Empty Mirror, Midnight Lane Gallery, Bareback Lit and is a Contributing Poet over at the wonderful Mad Swirl.  If you like what you've read go send a friend request on facebook to bradfordmiddleton1.