NO RHYMES

NO RHYMES

No rhymes, ballerina, these are troubled times.
No beams in the lighthouse for the mariner.

The masses are tossing, disturbed on their bed sheets,
Anxieties clogging their pores.

Feel ashamed and angry, ballerina,
Who was I to think I knew the way?

No rhymes, ballerina, and no time,
To tie a ribbon around my heart
And offer it to you, hoping it will suffice.

Sometimes I think, a basket of scorpions would be nice.

The weathermen are on in their funny hats,
Predicting with ten percent certainty
The world will indeed end in ice,
And not in fire, as previously reported.

No rhymes, ballerina, these are troubled times.
For I have learned to know my own mind
And what I’ve found there sends me screaming
Into the portals of the ghastly night.

It helps to know you are out there, ballerina, still devoted to me,
Keeping my dreams in your mind under lock and key.

Good to know you are out there, my muse and my friend,
Walking on the rushing waters, waiting in the howling winds.

-Bruce Potts
Revised Copyright 2010
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

HAVE A MOMENT'S PITY

HAVE A MOMENT’S PITY

So easy to snuff out the fire, to extinguish the life of a fragile heart.
I’m hanging to life by a slender thread, always missing the mark,
Clinging to all I have ever known, tallying each new breath.
Yet sometimes I count myself among the dead,
And sinking to my lowest depth.

You could pull the rug from under me,
the pillars could come crashing down.
The best it is behind me and I’m running out of time,
My confidence is shaken, like a battered town along the fault line.

I scarce know how to stay afloat, the oars are missing from this flimsy boat.
The lighthouses my only guide have lost electricity,
And now I’m drifting rudderless on tempestuous seas.
Hold off your hail and lightning, have a moment’s pity on me.

I was with you from a long time past,
Perhaps my fabled golden age was destined not to last.
But tears, they fill my anxious eyes, when I think of that last goodbye.
And in the name of progress, you could aim your wrecking ball
Full speed and merciless against my shrinking world,
And it will be too late for me, once that thunderbolt is hurled.

So easy to step on the helpless ant who longs for nothing but a crumb,
Don’t leave me to my blackness dire, when the fire dies low and the soul lies numb.

Hold off on your thirst for novelty and change,
My sleep is restless, stained with demons,
The losses mount, and life turns strange.
The world is spinning and I am falling, struggling hard to keep apace.
Have a moment’s mercy on me, a second of your healing grace.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2010
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

MAYBE IT'S TIME

MAYBE IT’S TIME

Maybe it’s time, to swim with the tide,
Sail along with the dolphins on their playful ride,
Dodge the sharks and the coral reefs,
Examining worn, outdated beliefs,
And live like the spirit of Jacques Cousteau,
Free on the ocean, enjoying the flow.

Maybe it’s time, to run with the deer,
White-tailed and innocent, nothing to fear,
Except the encroachment of man and machines,
Destroying habitat, wreaking havoc with dreams.
Maybe it’s time not to nod and to wink,
To take just a moment to stop and to think.

Maybe it’s time to fly with the birds,
Straight to the summit, a place beyond words.
The sweetest music you have ever heard,
Reverberates here in the drum of your ear.
Maybe it’s time to sing like the lark,
Or to trill like the nightingale late after dark.
When the pink maroon of sunset streaks in the sky,
As the day takes an overdose, preparing to die.
When all that we’ve seen and all that we’ve done,
Judged by the Father, pardoned by the Son,
Comes back to comfort or haunt with its power,
As the future unfolds like a welcoming flower.

Maybe it’s time, to cradle the world in soft loving hands.
To whisper your prayers for the family of man.
To tell a friend or lover that you love them so,
Relaxing soft into the flow, until it’s time for you to go.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2010
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED