Kevin the Witch was a long haired visionary. He came from deepest Cumbria and could recite Sir Gawain And The Green Knight in the original dialect. To this day I cannot read the medieval language of that poem, but to Kevin it was fundamental to his native culture. He was a northerner at heart, and when in the Lake District would spend hours sitting motionless on a remote peak, watching the clouds and the distant glint of water. This was a meditation that helped him bring forth a deeply buried dream horde. In time these dreams took over his mind entirely. Kevin was nineteen years old.
Kevin also liked Irish Stout, and it was through the bottom of a tipped up pint glass that I first spied Kevin. He was obviously extremely intelligent, but dangerously charismatic.I was intrigued,but also a little sceptical; was this a well crafted persona or the real Cumbrian boy? I still do not know the answer to this question.
There was something Messianic about Kevin. I was a little afraid of this streak in his nature, and as it turned out, I was right to nurture such misgivings. Terrors caused by the nuclear arms race must have tipped the balance of his mind: he was certain that the world was about to end.
Kevin was also interested in the Vikings; the film and not the real thing. Once he had downed a few pints he forgot the world`s demise and got deep into broad swords, Wagnerian helmets, rape and pillage. Not that he needed to adopt the ways of the ancient marauders to enhance his status; the girls really liked Kevin, and for a while his lover was a high class model, ten years his senior.
One night Kevin entered the pub in a state of excitement. He and a German friend had each had an identical dream. The world would end in September. The catastrophy would commence in Trafalgar Square when a squadron of man eating pigeons would darken the skies and descend on the screaming crowds huddled below. The Righteous would stand on the steps of St. Martin`s in the Fields, secure under the shadow of the portals. Someone must have been reading Daphne Du Maurier.
I unwittingly supplied the proof, for Kevin at least, that these visions contained a spark of validity in them. Whilst strolling down Charing Cross Road in the direction of the Square, my companion and I noticed a curious phenomenon. Marks on the pavement seemed to indicate that a pigeon with one leg missing had recently hopped across the flat stones, also heading towards the Square. It now seemed certain that our lives were about to be cut short.
Came the day, Kevin and his friends congregated on the steps of the church. One or two seemed to believe in the prophecy, but the rest of us just wanted to keep Kevin company. Once before he had tried to kill himself when a similar dream failed him.
It was a beautiful late summers day. Crowds milled about in the square; children paddled in the fountains; pigeons hustled for crumbs. The hour of doom came and passed. Kevin was philosophical. He pronounced that a deep hidden change had come upon the world that day. The Human Race had been given another chance. Perhaps he foresaw the advent of the Hippies.
But a week or two later I received a phone call from Kevin`s girl friend. He had tried to overdose and was now in Hospital. I visited his sick bed. He seemed so vulnerable. No longer the visionary dreamer, but a sensitive soul lost in the world of modern technology. When the visiting time was over, I had a curious premonition that I would never see Kevin again. Unlike the fantastical prophecies, this premonition has proved to be true.
Once Kevin had left the scene life became calmer, but also more mundane. He took a sort of innocence with him. The magic time was almost over. The profiteers were sniffing at our coat tails, hoping that a few golden eggs would fall.
Trevor John Karsavin Potter.
30th. April 2014.. .
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