On sunny weekends, this guy used to park himself under the Market House, stripped to the waist, with a lovely motorbike and yet never seemed to go anywhere.

It is a fine day in Ledbury.

Beneath the ancient market house, apart from all the rest,

Captain Kremmen finds a bench and bares his biker chest.

Sitting in his suit of plastic, ribbed and padded blue,

zipped down to his navel, he strikes a pose: a view

accepted by those

who have seen it before,

but something a stranger

could never ignore.

His black Kawasaki stands gleaming,

his helmet and gloves lie there steaming.

His mind may be quietly beaming,

but never a smile,

and never a word.

Kremmen is silent

and sweetly absurd.

It is a fine day in Ledbury.

Beneath the ancient market house, the young and elders sit,

but Captain Kremmen wants no part of them or us or it.

Preened and mirror-polished, his body and machine

take their time-allotted place, where they are surely seen.

Distractions will never

disrupt his parade,

he lives for the show,

for the show he is made.

His black Kawasaki stands gleaming,

his helmet and gloves lie there steaming.

His mind may be quietly beaming,

but never a smile,

and never a word.

Kremmen is silent

and sadly absurd.

It is a fine day in Ledbury.

Beneath the ancient market house, his journey half complete,

two minutes from the family home (a house just down the street),

Captain Kremmen spots a smudge and wipes it with a cloth,

then sits astride, then turns the engine on, then turns it off.

He stands, feet apart,

like some comic book hero:

His vanity high,

his magnitude zero. 

His black Kawasaki stands gleaming,

his helmet and gloves lie there steaming,

His mind may be quietly beaming,

but never a smile, and never a word.

Kremmen is silent, and blindly absurd.