Haunted

Help me. Help me.
Why did she whisper so?
There was an absence of accompanying music,
as her frail hand finally let go.

Wherever she wandered.
I couldn't follow. Neither could my eyes see.
But she reappears in this recurring dream:
Help me. Help me.


Capability Red        March 2016

The Initial Dream

Then the rain stopped, narrow rays of sunshine began filtering through thin layers of cloud.
I became vaguely aware that I was lying down. Looking up towards a rather tempestuous sky.
A beautiful arc of many colours captured my immediate attention.
So many colours without names.
Colours that mingled, yet remained distinguished.
Colours that had seen the light of day.
And I was smiling, although I had nothing to smile about.
I decided to make a wish, although there was nothing I was without.
And so.
I rose.
Gazing inquisitively around me.
I was not alone!


Capability Red           1978

Scrapbook

Her life is a scrapbook
of endless romances.
Flower power memories
not to mention the chances.
Friends won. Enemies lost.
The carving out of dreams,
zebra crossing meetings.
It now seems oh so different.
Festivals, fashions come and go:
So do lovers, doesn't she know.
Her life is a scrapbook
cuttings and headlines.
But are they really; two 'a penny?
Think once, think twice.
Perhaps there wasn't so many.


Capability Red            aprox'   1977

My Imaginary Friend

He is all seeing and knowing, my imaginary friend.
Ask me anything you want? he calmly requests.
The future is void and without form.
Anything could happen in the next half hour.

The scriptwriter of perception, my imaginary friend.
I think therefore I am: Or; am I? I hurriedly ask.
If you paraphrase your peers you will walk
endlessly in circles, he warns.

Every day he is with me, my imaginary friend.
So, I ask him: Who were the pollinators of Eden?
He smiles at me and whispers:
The gods themselves came later than creation.

He protects me from myself, my imaginary friend.
Wisest is he who knows what he does not know.
She cannot compete with him.
Her satisfaction is temporary..

My imaginary friend was the real myth of the cave, he says.
And he explains to me;
the deception of the shadows.
Bewildered, I gaze in awe. How can I doubt him?

I'm in the primeval playground with my imaginary friend.
He shows me a pair of scissors. These cannot be improved.
Nevertheless he courteously invites:
Here is my atomic Lego.

What is your greatest invention? I ask my imaginary friend.
I listen as he shifts; north; south; east; west.
Common sense is not common. Neither is a common cause.
But. We have so much in common!


Capability Red           December 2015

Nursery Crimes

Peregrine spied on a council estate
reciting nursery crimes.
Little Jack Horner's an Essex man
he wrote in the Sunday Times.

Mary had a little lamb
but now it's growing old.
She'd like to live in a council flat,
sadly, it's already been sold.

All things bright and beautiful
Johnny won't work any faster,
he cut his hand on the lathe
and there's blood seeping through the plaster.

Jack and Jill went up the hill
'cos they wouldn't let them in,
a policeman stopped them at the top
and asked them where they'd been.

Fashions come and labels go,
still; wealth remains in style.
The sign said; 'Do Not Trespass'.
Where are the rank and file?

The rich man is still in his castle
but there's trouble at the gate,
folk have had enough of this
and why should they have to wait?

Today I met an old man
who would not say his prayers,
struggling on his pension
he reckons nobody cares.

Bankers in their counting house
drooling over their money,
heard about redundancies
and thought it was so funny.

Humpty Dumpty had a pay cut
Little Bo Peep has lost her job,
Little Miss Muffet stood up and said:
"why don't we join that marching mob?"

Margaret Hilda quite contrary
how does your conscience rot?
Those unemployed were null and void
the folk that you forgot.

But we march along singing
as the red flag is unfurled.
My enemies might be dead
but I still want to change the world!


Capability Red             November 2015

Lay me to rest in your memories

Lay me to rest in your memories,
on a day without tomorrow.
Hotel 'Only Yesterday'
has no vacancies for sorrow.

These lines that you now read.
You can still hear flowing from my tongue.
In those days when you were younger.
And I was simply young.

The two of us wore No Entry signs,
back when we first met.
And you recall every moment:
Ha! Even what you wore, I bet.

I'll always be a part of you.
Don't imagine I have gone.
And don't waste money on flowers.
Or a grave to rest them on.

If there's life beyond, I'll let you know.
If not; c'est la vie. So:
Lay me to rest in your memories.
That's where I want to be.


Capability Red       September 2015

Flee From Ganymede

Let the sentinel lie buried.
Perishing not in the frozen depths.
So deep beneath icy terrains.
One day to warrant man's respect.
Oh. Flee, flee from Ganymede.
Before it's too late.
We will never return.
Flee, flee from Ganymede.
The rampant ice will surely burn.
One day in the future man will arrive.
To conquer the desolate barren waste.
That day, we too shall be alive.
To pass judgement on the human race.
Oh. Flee, flee from Ganymede.
Jupiter's child.
Metaphysical moon.
Flee, flee from Ganymede.
Lest man should discover a day too soon.


Capability Red     1979