Dearest Red Room,

It’s been a novel since we last spoke. I trust you’re as healthy as
ever and getting to meet many beautiful souls.
My prose has been lacking practice being away from you like this.
My painting, on the other hand, is never without its purpose, feeling
in the dark as it does; knowing the truth is there.

What it feels suggests there is a roulette at play during all parts of our day.
Every now and then I take a risk and gamble.
Much to the dismay of my as yet adult John Winston Lennon dog.
I wonder if, like John, he realizes the extent of our plight. I care much.
I paint so he gets fed. So he grows. So he one day knows.
Some days I go away and come back with food.
Other days I back away and come and go with a muse.
What have we to lose.
We all need to play, and that itself is food. So, one day comes, one day goes.
I’m getting closer to the knows. As in one who knows.

Puppy dog eats, puppy dog plays, puppy dog poohs and enjoys chewing my shoes.
Puppy dog sleeps. His daddy stays up and onto his canvas he weeps.
Money is butter. It slips through his fingers, but it’s not something
he spreads on toast.

I’ve heard of some people blowing their nose on dollar notes.
I’ve also heard some people believe in popes.
But I happen to know that shit floats, (given enough fat).
What does Dr.Zeuss’s cat have to say about that?

Tell me Red Room, with all one’s rehearsing, ranting, ravings and romanticising.
What do those people in front of you,
who so kindly unshingle their chastised feet for you,
have to say about where we are?
Is the enclosed writer free to read your mind?
Does the view seem real to you?
What would you see if I remain silent?

I am a shallow multi talented single man with aspirations to find a super model
with a head upon her pretty thin shoulders
and an eternal twinkle in her eye just for me.
I am without a doubt a very naive post modern expressionist by day and
a surreal impressionist by night.
A midnight toker, (when given the opportunity).
A self critical insomniac and a red wine prophet in need.
A thinker, a blinker, a lover, a dreamer, a doer, a prover.
Am I talking to myself again, or are you there with me?

A dead man once told me ” Be accommodating to all those souls, but
always allow time for your own.”
Red to me is the colour of my soul. It is that which flows through me
and came from a place I have no fine knowledge of.
Knowledge these days is overrated. It is tainted. It is steered by its
horns with invisible clutches. It is outside this space.

Red Room, you are coursing through all our veins. You are always here
when we appear. We won’t forget to lend an ear. What we learn from you
is nothing new. We come here because of you.

And if every generation has its beat, then why wait for the stomp of feet.
Or the climate change to raise the heat. Are we here to raise a glass?
Are we here to stop a farce? Are you the one to ask?
Should we treat your stage as our mask?
Is your wine table there to help us read our line?
All these questions are answered in time. And time is all it takes
once you’ve realized what time takes from you.
The anagram emit shows clearly what we miss.

But back to the point, and the point being sharp.
All the world is a stage and all in the world have their rightful time.
Yet when the world whines not all of us hear in time.
Is this why when I need water all I want is wine?

Red Room, must we come here to be read?
What if I am blue and know not what to do?
What if I am green with envy?
What if my words have a silver lining?
What if my golden tongue knows no rest?
And if from darkness comes the light, then one’s truth must surely be revealed.
At which point, as a soul would state, there is no turning back.
There exists no choice.

Alive is felt once out of one’s hive. One can sting like a bee
and float like a butterfly.
It’s here there and everywhere.
There is more than one sky in which one must try.
Find out what it’s like to have happy tears shed.
That dead man is me. I just like projecting ahead.
And here resides my biggest clue to each and every one of you.

by TIMOTHY NATHAN JOEL. DULAN 2010.