Mind Games

2713 miles away
You’ve played e4
And in the same instant
I watch it on screen,
My stomach churning
The same way it did
21 years ago,
When you showed me
How you saved a lost game
With a double rook sacrifice.

You’d played
in the next room then
And I could not watch,
Just sat there trying
To fill my mind
With any old nonsense,
Waiting for your face
To appear at the glass.

There was a time,
Before you learnt
To take the piss,
When I could always tell
The result before you spoke.
You just couldn’t stop
Beaming, but now
That I can follow you
Move by move,
I still can’t fathom
What’s going on.

Richard is playing for Wales in the Chess Olympiad in Khanty Mansisk.