Saturday, June 29, 2013

WALK WITH ME

WALK WITH ME

Walk with me,
Let's hop down these spring streets
Like rabbits in heat.

And try to dispel all this crazy energy.

Let's look at the houses
And swing from the trees
And marvel at the squirrels
And mock this technological world
With our healthy frames.

We'll make up funny names 
For the people that we pass.
Hold each other's hands
And pretend our love will last.

Talk a little dirty, spread some harmless lies,
Like where babies really come from, and the origin of fireflies.
Spread vicious rumors about the sun and sky,
Make believe we're two year olds, our every question why.

Wonder at the beauty,
Call in sick and shirk our duty.
Learn to loaf like harmless oafs.
Beavis and Butthead minus the menace,
More like Ethel and Lucy or Tom and Jerry.
That Butthead dude is kinda scary,
That Beavis a little too fond of fire.
Perhaps we'd be twin Tweety Birds,
Singing on a fence wire.

It is so much finer, to hang with a mischievous crowd,
To sing off key and raucously loud.
Into your lover's ear until the break of dawn,
Always ensuring they'll miss you when you're gone.
To wake with glee to find, you may still have some time,
Just before the heart it flails and then begins to flat line.

Walk with me,
Let's hop down these spring streets
Like rabbits in heat.
Admire the neighbors' gardens
And their fancy garden fountains.
Roll around in all their yards 'til they come outside and scold us,
And into model citizens how they'll try to mold us.
And then we'd be slaves to their every whim and wish,
No longer free to roam at will, to gossip and to dish

But I say fun is worth the risk of running into a gloomy Gus,
And Fate will lead us to the yards of nice people like us.
And I have a little secret to whisper in your ear
As we swing from the trees and marvel at the squirrels
And mock this technological world.
The secret it is only this, I am dying for a little kiss,
And hope you'll not feel put upon, if I tell you you're my only one.
If I should one day up and say, I dig those legs you're moving on.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2013
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Saturday, June 22, 2013

CATAPULT ME INTO THE UNIVERSE

CATAPULT ME INTO THE UNIVERSE

Mount my coffin high on the horses.
Send away the procession and the stone coal black hearse.
Lay down the violin with its golden strings.
I'm ready to fly and spreading my wings,
Fire off the cannons, catapult me into the universe.

Years ago when I walked the earth,
Tasted its nectar and felt its deep worth.
I breathed in all the flowers,
Spent many sweet hours,
Rolling in the grasses,
Drinking red wine from rose colored glasses.

Traversing the sands of many fine lands,
Had me a companion and a house in the sticks,
Had a guitar, played mediocre licks,
Had an old black dog who bathed my face each day,
The joy with which he greeted me infectious in its way.

But now that I'm gone, to that land beyond the dawn,
I hope to make my presence felt beyond the veil of tears.
I'm ancient as the sea and as a poignant as the atmosphere.
Now are days where I scale the clouds,
Counsel troubled spirits, teach their hearts to sing,
Now are quiet hours with a peace that passes understanding.
Now the sweet taste of nectar and ambrosia is my feast,
No more the sailor on the sea of salty brine, no more tango with the beast.
Now are precious moments of bloodless forms, vague outlines.
Now are times when I recognize God's higher purpose and design.
My doubting days are over, like Thomas I have felt the wounds,
The bloody holes in hands and feet.
Nothing there to deny or impugn,
The glory of redemption sweet.

Send me away in the firelight, into the caverns of the spirit's night.
Send away the mourners with their blazing torches.
Liberate me from the body and its chill that sweats and scorches.
Liberate me from disease that leaves me pleading on my knees.
Recite a few comforting rhymes, to lift me slowly out of time. 
Say one long lasting fond farewell, toast me with your holy wine
Then fire the cannons as rehearsed, catapult me into the universe.

Mount my coffin high on the horses,
Send away the mourners, ripping garments at the seams.
I will mount the white stallion,
Ride the fiery chariot to the realm of heaven's dream.
Wait 'til the tears subside, until the last church bell has sounded.
Spread the word until all have heard,
Death is only a brittle word,
A word twisting ghoulishly in the land of the grounded.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2013
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Saturday, June 8, 2013

PEEL THE PAINT FROM OFF THE PONY

PEEL THE PAINT FROM OFF THE PONY

Peel the paint from off the pony,
Be it acrylic or be it lead.
Bring down the curtain on the sideshow,
The carousel is dead.

Steal the shimmer from the huckster,
The baffled babbling of the barker.
His syntax has become lackluster,
His economic prospects darker.
His claims they seem outlandish in the garish light of day,
The vultures they are circling, may they carry him away.

Peel the paint from off the pony,
Everyone's too busy,
Chasing down their dimming dreams,
Their hustle makes me dizzy.
Their vocation devours and vexes,
Chase down the soothsayers, destroy their hexes.
While you're at it, show no mercy, hunt down every clown,
Wipe away the greasepaint of the men who let me down.

Dismantle the dogeared dagger,
Of the glowing knife throwing slave.
Throw out the fat and happy louts,
Say farewell to the foolish knave.
Let the creditors come with a fine tooth comb,
Finger every crucifix and pilfer the last gnome.
Take my car while you are at it,
And likewise steal my home.

Tell me this is what I get for a life in disarray.
Tell me this is all I have to show at the end of the day.
Give me nothing but the cold hard facts,
The graveyard, the inheritance tax.
The pied piper leading the pack,
Careful to pounce on every crack,
Leaving me broken, each bone in my back.
Peel the paint from off the pony,
You army of insomniacs.

Tell me this is my birthright, for better or for worse,
Tell me I have been forsaken, tell me I am cursed,
That this weariness is all I've earned for my efforts through the years,
A room that's strewn with flowers black and wallpapered with tears.
Tell me I will live forever, a hapless motionless man,
Whose eyes they feast upon the sky, whose feet are mired in quicksand.

Lay your evil hands upon my odd misshapen head,
The brain that once was pliable and held me in good stead.
Shake out every penny from the pig shaped wishing well,
Leave me here to prosper in the flaming fires of hell.
Do your damage, go your way,
Then come again another day to finish up the work,
Like some vicious pirate, like some fearsome Turk.

Raze this wasteland of a body, raze it to the ground,
Destroy every brain cell left, then leave without a sound.
Peel the paint from off the pony,
Acrylic based or lead,
Bring down the curtain on the sideshow,
The carousel is dead.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2013
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Saturday, June 1, 2013

SUNSHINE, MOONSHINE, LIFELINE

SUNSHINE, MOONSHINE, LIFELINE

My friends, they are my sunshine,
My lover, he's my moonshine,
My spirit it's my lifeline,
To sing myself to sleep.

How I love the sunbeams,
The quiet warmth of the old salty men and women
Who pass the day at the old swanky hotel.
I love them for their wisdom and the way that they raise hell,
And most of all I love them for taking me in,
When I hadn't a hope or a trace of a friend.
I think of hobnobbing  with all of the rascals I've known,
What a privilege it is to live to be old.
It's easy to say what's on your mind,
When people already think you're insane,
To no longer suffer fools gladly, to pounce on the inane.
My friends they comfort in the deep imposing winter snows,
And then something sweet and familiar inside just glows.

How I love the moonbeams,
The dark mysterious tapestry of my lover,
His powerful prowess beneath the covers.
My comrade-in-arms, the warmth of another's flesh,
He always keeps it interesting, always keeps it fresh.
And when all I really have the energy for,
Is to lay my head in surrender on his shoulder.
My love, he always understands,
Content to sit and hold my hand.
How I love the moonbeams.
That shine in the generous eyes of this man.

How I love the lifeline that ties me to this earth.
Grateful for my day of birth to parents who loved me
And an older brother who became a friend,
Who in childhood days would shove me.
How grateful to the doctors who tend to my disease,
Grateful to the God who made me, who hears my every plea.

How I love the lifeline that ties me to this world so fair,
That comforts my aloneness, answers all my prayers.
The spirit of the universe that every living being shares.
The lullaby of our existence, such a strange and soft subsistence.

A lifeline to real time and a lifeline to those in cyberspace,
A daily dose of mercy and a dollop of God's grace.
A firm reminder I am cared for, cherished over miles,
The cyber friends who pen me notes and send me private smiles.

It's nothing false or counterfeit, just a natural triumvirate,
The gifts that pour like fine vintage wine, of sunshine, moonshine, lifeline.
Thankful for them each and all, they always answer when I call,
And always in the nick of time, to dress the wound and brace the fall.
To lend their humor and their grace and put the joy back on my face.

My friends, they are my sunshine,
My lover, he's my moonshine,
My spirit it's my lifeline,
To sing myself to sleep.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2013
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...