Favourite Shirt Poem by Gary Diamond

There is a corner of the closet where the old and the cherished reside.
I don't look there much or dust it that often but it fills me with some form of pride.
It houses the clothes that are so loved or over-used
That they are threadbare and faded from the many machines
And the many boxes of washing powder once poured over them.

Some have cigarette butt burns
Holes from being caught on fences
Streaks of emulsion paint that just wouldn't come out
Some undefined and worrying stains of one kind
Or another.

Why keep hold of this old trash, we ask ourselves.
Then we remember that that was the shirt won when your team got through to the final
Many many years ago.
This was the shirt, now many sizes too small
That was on the body when it got it's first proper kiss from a boy or girl.
Here are the jeans that were worn once on the stag night
Where you doused your friends hair in champagne
Then messed up his best man's speech while drunk on wine the next day.

Although these clothes are somewhat useless as garments
They are refreshing like a burst of sea spray
To remind us that they got that way when we were riding the crest of many good times.
Breaking through and past the dull routine into the thrill of really loving life.