The Craven

An alternative take on The Raven

Once upon an evening beery, pint in hand and getting cheery
Over many a brew and listening to the tunes across the floor
As we chatted, nearly shouting, there she was all gorgeous, pouting
Just like some chick on the look out, look out for a paramour
“Where’s her boyfriend at?” I questioned “coming through the outside door?”
Was it him that I just saw?

Often, now, my mates remind me how they stood that night behind me
And they watched as I aligned me with the bird in red Dior
“Not a chance!” they mocked me brightly so I stated, quite politely,
“Chicks are helpless in my presence and they end up wanting more”
“Similar to sexy Bond girls once they’d bedded Roger Moore”
“Watch me as I take the floor”

Then she glanced in my direction with, I thought, a clear affection
For the brand new French Connection pastel tee-shirt that I wore
I responded broadly smiling, in my head, a line compiling
That would surely strike her sweet-spot, sweeter than a candy store
“Alright luv, you seem familiar, have I seen you here before?”
This she will not dare ignore

Patiently she stood there waiting, evidently contemplating
This cool dude she’d soon be dating as he weaved his path unsure.
As I into tables blundered, let my mind go wild and wondered
If she’d have a hyphen in her email, or an underscore?
“Hello love, your glass seems empty, p’raps another drink or four?”
Only then, she knew the score.

Shocked, she seemed, with admiration, at my direct navigation
To her bar-side situation and my self-assured rapport
So she simply stared unblinking and I offered, without thinking
“You look tasty in that outfit. Is it from the discount store?”
“No, of course not” she responded. We weren’t strangers anymore!
Time to make this tigress roar.

Never fearful of conversing, I then launched (without rehearsing)
Into repartee traversing subjects from the toppest drawer
Diverse insights and compelling thoughts and stories I’d be telling,
As comfortable with Pluto’s rings as I am with Yom Kippur
She just kept on looking at me then over to the open door
There’s the bloke I’d seen before!

But he didn’t stop at stalking! He just headed over, walking
Quickly now as I was talking to the chick like Cindy Craw…
…Ford who seemed now rather prickly, turning to this guy too quickly
For my taste it must be mentioned – wrecking our esprit-de-corps
Had she hoped that this upturn would not present to me a flaw?
Fishy, this was, to be sure…

I’d read tales of babes perverted, who with strangers often flirted
Until in your drinks they’d squirted funny stuff that makes you snore.
But too late! They’re caught red-handed! Soon they’ll be in cells remanded
When I call the cops and invoke all due process of the law.
I would stop their wicked plans and their imprisonment ensure.
Now truly, they are done for!

But to their guilt who would attest? For I had not yet acquiesced
Which means the cops could never test for the dope and drugs galore…
And neither he nor she would sing about their plans to do this thing
Thus it fell to me to trap these two, both guilty to the core.
So I grabbed the bird quite roughly and the guy, who loudly swore!
Just before he punched my jaw.

Then, while slowly I recovered, all around me people hovered
Saying that they’d not discovered anyone as daft before
“Chatting up the Landlord’s daughter!” “Grabbing on the coat he’d bought ‘er!”
“She at sixteen! With a boyfriend from the local army corps!”
So my mates came to save me; their failed, sore conquistador
Cos that is what mates are for.