Saturday, September 24, 2011

NO MORE SADNESS

NO MORE SADNESS

Today I’ll play the role of a clown,
Dancing, dancing in the daylight glory.

Tempting the sun to follow in my footsteps,
Letting all the newspapers in on my story.

I’ll scream a great big hi, to all the passersby.
It’s a funky, funky life,
So tell your children and your wife.

I’ll prance all day long on my pogo stick,
Practice a little vaudeville schtick,
And let the harmonies ring.

With tunes of gladness and no more sadness,
Just watch those people sing.

Life is too short for the tears of a minstrel,
Dancing, dancing in your morning tea.

Forget the bad news in the morning daily,
Grab your coat and a ukulele,
Come merrily along with me.

Down the funky, funky sidewalks,
With restless gait and nonsense talk.

We’ll bring cheer to the neighborhoods,
And let them know we’ve got the goods,

Banish all the pain and sorrow,
Find the gold at the end of the rainbow.

Today we’ll play the role of clowns,
Tiptoeing through the tulips, the petunias and the roses,
Dancing, dancing merrily in the daylight glory,
Smiling in our greasepaint and our bright red noses.

We’ll catch the latest funny flick.
Play fast and loose with the vaudeville schtik
And let the zingers zing.
With tunes of gladness and no more sadness
Just watch those people sing.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Saturday, September 17, 2011

DIRTY SALLY

DIRTY SALLY

She was old as the Bible and could curse like a sailor,
A shoe-in for crime but at romance a failure.

No tougher cowgirl had ever come before her,
And there has been no tougher since.

Many a ragged mile she would ride,
Hugging her horse as it jumped the fence.

And she went down fighting at the end,
Down the dusty road by the river’s bend.

Dirty Sally died in her boots.
Wednesday it was when she left us,
A wild rapscallion, a gloomy guss.

Doesn’t anyone sing for this ragged cowgirl?

Doesn’t anyone want to dance around the funeral pyre for Dirty Sally?
To eulogize the bullet holes in her ancient life?
To memorialize her pain and her never ending strife?

Doesn’t anyone sing for this ragged cowgirl?

Dirty Sally, who never took a man
And who had gaps in her western teeth.

Doesn’t anyone pause to visit her grave
And on it place a tender wreath?

She built her own silences, built her own cradle,
Dug her own grave,
Here in the land of the free,
Here in the home of the brave.

She died unforgiven, her sins unatoned,
And left behind nothing but a skull and some crossbones.

Oblivious to the pain she had caused you and me.
Let us dance around the funeral pyre, wish her a gorgeous eternity.

Dirty Sally died in her boots.
Wednesday it was and raining.
And the world never noticed, turning ‘round like a whirl.
Doesn’t anyone sing for this ragged cowgirl?

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Saturday, September 10, 2011

FOLK DANCE

FOLK DANCE

My dear man, you remind me of the old country,
Of my mother drying her hands by the fire,
The good old tent revival, the preacher and the choir.

You remind me of the scent of homemade bread,
Of fresh cotton sheets on a freshly made bed.

The aroma of the good life thrills me to the bone.
My dear man, it’s because of you, you and you alone.
The river it baptizes, our love a precious stone.

And you remind me of the evening star,
That spreads its brightness near and far.

Of rainy nights in front of the fire,
The winter of my deep content,
The throbbing pulse of my desire.

You remind me of good old fashioned holidays,
Of a better time and place,
Of when the world belonged to me,
A soldier in a sacred space.

My dear man, you remind me of the folklore,
Of some gallant place I have been before,
A place where memories are stored,
The cider jug, the tambourine,
The mouth harp and the washboard.

The folks who danced their troubles
Beyond the farthest mountaintop,
A great and glorious harvest,
A picture perfect crop.

You remind me of the lonesome oak,
The oxen and the yoke,
The graveyards in the moonlight,
Of those that fought the good fight.

My dear man, you remind me
Of some longed for ancient home.

And I long so to be baptized,
In the scent of your cologne.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Saturday, September 3, 2011

CASTLES IN THE FOG

CASTLES IN THE FOG

Life spans are brief and illusory,
Like the first morning dew on a manicured lawn,

And what lives soon dies,
In the too quiet hours of the dawn.

And each life is a monument,
Tall and proud with many rooms,
Teetering upon the fault line,
Set to tumble all too soon.

And we are all kings and queens,
Silk and satin and fancy things.
Our lives are castles,
Nestled in the hills of our every breath.
We start out strong then limp along,
Lurching slowly towards our death.

My love, you are as dazzling as a castle tower,
This love affair has been my crowning final hour.

Your body is alluring, stunning in its strength,
A mysterious castle in the mist I wish to explore at length

So lend to me a song and a rhyme,
A little of your royal time.

For kingdoms have fallen in a single day,
Their riches tossed and torn,

Often lying mangled with the coming of the morn.

Life spans are brief and illusory, sinking like a city in its smog,
And I fear losing you, in the cover of the mystic fog.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

SERENADE OF TWILIGHT

SERENADE OF TWILIGHT

SERENADE OF TWILIGHT The stars in your eyes, love, I tried them on for size. They shone as bright as diamonds, how they mesmerized. And when...