1. CIRKUS
INCLUDING ENTRY OF THE CHAMELEONS

Night: her sable dome scattered with diamonds,
Fused my dust from a light year,
Squeezed me to her breast, sowed me with carbon,
Strung my warp across time.
Gave me each horse, sunrise and graveyard,
Told me only I was her;
Bid ne face the east closed me in questions
Built the sky for my dawn ...

Cleaned my feet of mud, followed the empty
Zebra ride to the Cirkus,
Past a painted cage, spoke to the paybox
Glove which wrote on my tonque -
Pushed me down a slide to the arena,
Megaphonium fanfare
In his cloak of words strode the ringmaster
Bid me join the parade ...

"Worship!" - cried the clown. "I'm a T.V.
Making bandsmen go clockwork,
See the slinky seal Cirkus policeman,
Bareback ladies have fish."
Strongmen by his feet, plate-spinning statesman,
Accrobatically juggling -
Bids his tamers go quiet the tumblers
Lest the mirror stop turning ...

Elephants forgot, force-fed on stale chalk,
Ate the floors of their cages.
Strongmen lost their hair, paybox collapsed and
Lions sharpened their teeth.
Gloves raced round the ring, stallions stampeded
Pandemonium seesaw ...
I ran for the door, ringmaster shouted,
"All the fun of the Cirkus!"


2. INDOOR GAMES

Indoor fireworks amuse your kitchen staff
Dusting plastic garlic plants
They snigger in the draught
When you ride throw the parlour
Wearing nothing but your armour -
Playing Indoor Games.

One string puppet shows amuse
Your sycophantic friends
Who cheer your rancid recipes
In fear they might offend,
Whilst you loaf on your sofa
Sporting falsies and a toga -
Playing Indoor Games, Indoor Games.

Your mean teetotum spins arouse your seventh wife
Who pats her sixty little skins
And reinsures your life,
Whilst you sulk in your sauna
'Cos you lost your jig-saw corner -
Playing Indoor Games, Indoor Games.

Each afternoon you train baboons to sing
Or swim in purple perspex water wings.
Come Saturday jump chopper, chelsea brigade.
High bender-trender it's all Indoor Games.

No ball bagatelle incites
Your children to corspire.
They slide across your frying pan
And fertilise your fire;
Still you and Jones go madder
Broken bones - broken ladder -
Hey Ho ...


3. HAPPY FAMILY

Happy family, one hand clap, four went
by and none came back.
Brother Judas, ash and sack, swallowed
aphrodiciac
Rufus, Silas, Jonah too sang, "We'll blow
our own canoes,"
Poked a finger in the zoo, punctured
all the ballyhoo.

Whipped the world and beat the clock,
wound up with their share of stock.
Silver Rolls from golden rock,
shaken by a knock, knock, knock.
Happy family, wave that grin,
what goes round must surely spin;
Cheescake, mousetrap, Grip-Pipe-Thynne
cried out, "We're not Rin-Tin-Tin."

Uncle Rufus grew his nose,
threw away his cirkus clothes
Cousin Silas grew a beard,
drew another flask of weird
Nasty Jonah grew a wife,
Judas grew his pruning knife.
Happy family, one hand clap,
four went on but none came back.

Happy family, pale applause,
each to his revolving doors.
Silas searching, Rufus neat,
Jonah caustic, Jude so sweet.
Let their sergeant mirror spin
if we lose the barbers win;
Happy family, one hand clap,
four went on but none came back.


4. LADY OF THE DANCING WATER

Grass in your hair stretched like a lion in the sun
Restlessly turned moistened your mouth with your tonque.
Pouring my wine your eyes caged mine glowing
Touching your face my finger strayed knowing
I called you lady of the dancing water.

Blown autumn leaves shed to the fire where you laid me.
Burn slow to ash just as my days now seem to be.
I feel you still always your eyes glowing
Remembered hours salt, earth and flowers flowing.
Farewell my lady of the dancing water.


5. LIZARD INCLUDING PRINCE RUPERT AWAKES AND BOLERO-THE PEACOCK'S TALE

Farewell the temple master's bells
His kiosk and his black wormseed
Courtship solely of his word
With Eden guaranteed.
For now Prince Rupert's tears of glass
Make saffron sabbath eyelids bleed
Scar the sacred tablet wax
On which the Lizards feed.

Wake your reasons' hollow vote
Wear your blizzard season coat
Burn a bridge and burn a boat
Stake a Lizard by the throat

Go Polonius or kneel
The reapers name their harvest dawn
All your tarnished devil's spoons
Will rust beneath our corn.
Now bears Prince Rupert's garden roam
Across his rain tree shaded lawn
Lizard bones become the clay -
And there a Swan is born

Wake your reasons' hollow vote
Wear your blizzard season coat
Burn a bridge and burn a boat
Stake a Lizard by the throat

Gone soon Piepowder's moss-weed court
Round which upholstered Lizards sold
Visions to their leaden flock
Of rainbows' ends and gold
New tales Prince Ruppert's peacock brings
Of walls and trumpets thousand fold
Prophets chained for burning masks
And reels of dream unrolled ...