I Haven't Got a Chance

Note: I wrote this poem back in 1973 when I was 17. Looking back, was I really that angry and resentful then? Apparently so.......

I didn't ask to be called Douglas, I never had a say.

It was all down to the old man, he always got his way.

He's called Douglas so he must know how I feel,

I'm not sure about him but I feel bloody ill.

I didn't ask to be born, but since I had no choice,

'suppose I'd rather be alive, just; one of the boys.

I could have been born in Surrey, I could have been born in France,

But I'm sick to death of the east end, I haven't got a chance!

Capability Red          1973

Smike

Sadly he lies in an orchard all alone
in a short life he knew no joy.
He remembers a hook in the attic.
Can we help but remember our fears?
Years at Dotheboys, horror, shame.
Wake up and........nobody there.
He wasn't allowed to live
don't tell me he's dead,
a victim of prejudice
Abandoned. Forgotten
not meant for this world.
Smike my heart cries out for you
though no tears can help you now.
Perhaps you can hear this
wherever you are.
Alone he lies in an orchard.
But he looks up and smiles.
One light in his life
in his poor narrow existence,
one light.
He confided 'I've loved her'
just before he floated away.
Kate, he loved you
although he was much too frightened to say.
Poor Smike
he seeks no revenge.
Let him rest.



Capability Red               1975

Somebody has to come Second

Somebody has to come second,
but if it's my daughter, I'll scream.
She'll marry a lawyer
the Jones' I'll redeem.

Somebody has to come second,
although, they might as well be third.
A paragraph in the small print
and nobody reads a word.

Somebody must be a loser
I know, he'll be a loser himself.
Somebody has to come second,
but let it be somebody else!



Capability Red        aprox' 1977

Lord Goldfish Bowl

My name is Lord Goldfish Bowl,
I'm sixty five, getting old.
But, tickety boo chaps, you know,
I take my seat at the Lord Mayor's show.

Crosswords, absurds, I still laugh,
I've got hot water in my bath,
I don't worry if you're on strike,
I'm a Lord and I do as I like!

Velvet curtains, chandeliers,
Barons, Earls, wigs and peers,
parquet flooring in my hall
two way mirrors on the wall.

My name is Lord Goldfish Bowl,
I bought my wife a pure mink stole,
drive a Bentley twice a week
seems like beauty's pocket deep.

My name is Lord Goldfish Bowl,
I've got titles in a row
I have money in the sky,
Hope it's there when I die.



Capability Red               1976

In a London Pub

Drink to my health in a London pub, a proper London boozer,
sit among the nearly was, could have been's and losers.
On the zephyr of a conversation discreetly overheard
like the line you wish you'd written, I float with every word.
The easily distracted, under achieving, cast of a cast off club
stay cloaked in anonymity, in the corner of a London pub.


Capability Red      2013

The Day Your Life Changed

You'll never ever be the same,
this is real, not a game,
it's happened, there's no-one to blame.
Today your life has changed.

I felt a sense of deja vu,
when I heard all about you,
you'll understand, you'll feel it too,
on the day your life changed.

I remember. But where was you?
Walking? Talking? Along that avenue,
I didn't believe it, it wasn't true.
But that day my life changed.



Capability Red         July 2013

On A Bench By The Brook

Sylvia sits on a bench by the brook,
nobody asks her the time as the day passes slowly.
Children run, shout, fall, or was that yesterday?
Tomorrow is a far away country watching the brook flow.

All of a somewhere a siren sounds.
Mothers alarmed, gather loved ones.
It's quiet again, the 'all clear' must have sounded,
Sylvia trembles, she forgot her gas mask.

That long ago? Was it one of ours?
Where have they gone? It's starting to rain.
Sylvia listens to the gentle pitter patter,
sitting all alone at dusk on a bench by the brook.


Capability Red       July 2013