Take A Shine

It's hard making friends
in middle age,
it seems gauche, seems inappropriate;
I'm not throwing keys in the fruitbowl,
you must know I'm content with my lot,
that I want more.

It feels hard being the portent
of some bright new age,
the pub at Christmas,
peers pulled into lives,
mine seems just beginning,
but re-skinned,
a concertina with thigh strain,
so in the pub looking for portents,
wanting to reach back a few years,
find new friends,
for the gauche new age,
I can barely let them see.