MY FRIEND

MY FRIEND 

Stoical and true, stalwart as a towering statue

Found in some European park,

My friend stands over me,

Protecting the thin layers of my onion-skin soul.

And I love my friend,

Because he is so gallant and understanding,

Immovable in his caring,

Like a mother who glues herself to her newborn,

He glues his thoughts of poetry and flowers 

To the fabric of the puzzle we have built,

Forged in fire with clasped hands, the interlocking pieces.

And I love my friend because he showers lilacs and lamplight,

Across the patched surface of my world weary head.

Making the path through the thorns and thistles,

Aglow with the warmth of summer flame..

Stoical and true,

Stalwart as a great statue,

My friend stands over me, 

Protecting the thin layers of my onion-skin soul.

-Bruce Potts

Copyright 2026

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

BIRDS AT PLAY

BIRDS AT PLAY

Birds at play on the lawn,

With their worms and their twigs and their chirping.

Birds at work in the trees,

With their spouses, their young, and their merriment.

Birds at play, in the world of the Spring,

With their pecking, trilling, and hopping.

Doing their specialized form of be-bopping

To the music of the sunny blue.

Birds at play,

Cheering the way,

For the lives of me and you,

The robin with his red breast trills a happy tune,

While the nightingale comes after dark to serenade the moon.

Birds at play in their treetop flats,

Devouring worms, avoiding cats.

Birds at play in the trees, ignoring human folly,

Making daydreams come alive, our waking moments jolly.

Birds at play on the lawn,

With their worms and their twigs and their chirping.

'

-Bruce Potts

Copyright 2026

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

PAJAMAS WITH FEET IN THEM

PAJAMAS WITH FEET IN THEM 

Falling in love with you

Has been like falling in the mud with white pants on.

You preach to me your Sunday morning sermon of dissent.

My heart collapses 

In the soiled, smoldering ashes of a ruined house.

I fell in love with you who did not know me

And I played my lonely come-on game

Only to awaken to a cold shower on a winter morning.

Losing you

Is like losing a goldfish down the drain.

Lost love empties into lost time.

Oil spills on the sea

Make everything bleak and distant.

I am crying on my own shoulder,

Leaviing when everyone else is staying,

Missing the last train,

Touching someeone's hand for the last time,

Traipsing over land mines of despair and fear,

Hopelessly lost in yesteryear,

Sleeping alone, in pajamas with feet in them.

-Bruce Potts

Copyright 2026

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

This poem was probably written in high school and belongs to my vast catalogue of lovelorn poems . I didn't find true love until I was 38 and met Kyle, my partner of nearly 25 years. So if I can find true love, there's hope for everybody.

I WISH FOR THE STARS

 I WISH FOR THE STARS

I wish for the stars,

The stars hanging in your heart.

I wish for the silence,

The silence of your glance.

I want you in my arms,

Not for my wandering.

I will stay stone awed

By your place in my bosom.

I weep for your happiness,

Under midnight's raucous cloak.

I fly in the face of you,

In love with the smoke rings.

I wish for the stars,

That you sprinkle in my dreams.

I wish for the fragrance,

Of all my life in you.

-Bruce Potts

Copyright 2026

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

CEILINGS

CEILINGS

I wove tapestries on  a thousand ceilings 

That night when you lay reckless in my fingertips and thoughts.

I used for inspiration the feelings 

That sprang along the passageways.

I played loud love songs into the afghan 

You once wrapped around your body, 

When this bed was our bed.

And these ceilings in these rooms were our ceilings.

I sang torch songs long after reasonable hours,

And when the sun went down, I wove to the light of candles.

 I dreamed tempestuous patterns, sighed exacting withered sighs.

I thought one too many carousels of celebration,

One too many thoughts of us in motion.

I wove psychedelic screams in all the corridors.

I wove heartbreak in a funk above the fireplace.

I wove you in every naked semblance of a man.

I wove until my heart collapsed from heat exhaustion in the desert.

i wove tapestries on a thousand ceilings.

I wove screeching loud love songs into the afghan.

And after I had woven the night white,

I ate breakfast on a dirty plate of Tuesdays.

Bruce Potts

Copyright 2026

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Note:  This is a poem of unrequited love from the archives, that I wrote either in high school or college

RADIO

RADIO 

Radio,

Play your songs.

You've been such a kind friend

To someone like me, just trying to hold on

I like you smooth disc jockeys

And I like those Top 40 hits that you repeat,

Every four hours or so.

They make me feel awake and alive. 

I even like your commercials 

With that glossy ad man's jive.

I like your weather reports

The sunny way you look at life

Through sunny microphones

 I like your traffic reporters

That lead us safely home.

How I love you smooth disc jockeys,

And your sweet Top 40 songs.

Radio, keep playing strong.

You've been such a kind friend

To someone like me,

Just trying to hold on.

-Bruce Potts

Copyright 2026

ALL RGHTS RESERVED

THE MAELSTROM

THE MAELSTROM

Perilously disease progresses,

Leaving me trapped inside my own body, 

These days the meds are downright shoddy.

The DBS has lost its promise.

The doctors for once at a loss for words.

And I cannot say I blame them

I've had a long time of freedom and grace,

Perhaps it's time to pay the Fiddler.

To look him in the eyes and face.

And thank him for the glorious times I've had

On this amazing race.

Truth be told I have prayed for death, 

If life can get no better than this

Having lost my vigor and my bliss.

And indeed my hopes and plans.

It's hard to admit I have lost the plot

Holding court with hapless hands

Twenty-five years have passed since I was diagnosed

It's a wonder I am still alive, dancing on the earth,

It's a wonder I'm still writing and still somewhat verbose,

Still fighting for life and for all it is worth.

But the strength is somehow leaving me, the will to live has followed,

What little resolve I thought I had left, Parkinson's has swallowed

Still I deign to hang around, for as long as there is life, there's hope

I hang on as I swing perilously toward the end of my rope.

Perhaps I can rally the troops again, though they are tired of fighting.

False hope breeds contempt, and the fires they need igniting.

But I am lost and playing dumb, getting sucked in by the maelstrom. 

Standing in llne, minding the queue, 

Drowning in its sure swift current, witn little hope of rescue.

- Bruce Potts

 Copyright 2026

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED