Monday, March 28, 2011

LICK AND A PROMISE

LICK AND A PROMISE

The pole it hangs invitingly, in lavish splendor over me,
And it’s not that I don’t recognize, that look of longing in your eyes.
But tonight that pole is out of reach, and I am stiff as you are randy.
I’ll pull a phrase from my mother’s day, a phrase that I’ve kept handy.

Let me give you a lick and a promise and then just let it go,
Perhaps tomorrow I will feel more like the Full Monty and the Big O.
But tonight I’d rather lose myself in the velvet comfort of these sheets,
Against the sinews of your arms, around me soft and sweet.

I’ll give you a lick and a promise to your bulbous lollipop.
To ravish you forever and to never, ever stop.
But sometimes even electrodes and pills,
Just aren’t enough to cure my ills,
And on those times when full blown would be super duper nice.
But such protracted pleasure is just not in the dice,
It’s times like these that a lick and a promise more than will suffice.

Your body teases, tantalizes, tempts me with its pose,
From your dirty golden hair to your sweet and precious toes.
And smack in the middle of all of this, this magic little stick,
Ga-Ga says it’s a disco, but I think that’s just her shtick.
But can I give it a lick and a promise, a promise that’s dyed in the wool,
That one night soon I will gladly ride you like that mechanical bull.
That mechanical bull in the cowboy saloon, the one that goes v-room, v-room.
Like a cowboy I am coming for you, sometime very soon.

But tonight, let’s just give it a lick and a promise,
This love affair is never a one night stand.
When the pills kick in I’ll be happy to dive right in,
And take your Situation well in hand.
Tonight just let me snuggle, beneath the stubble on your chin,
And dream of us in Paradise, sleeping next to your velvet skin.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

TROUBLE ON THE STAIRS

TROUBLE ON THE STAIRS

There’s trouble on the stairs for me, everywhere I go.
Trouble on the fire escape, trouble and a world of woe.
Near a set of stairs is never good for me to be,
A staircase is an endless source of much calamity.

There’s trouble on the stairs for me, be it day or be it night,
The stairs I can’t negotiate, try as I might like.
I tend to teeter on the edge, like some fool upon a ledge,
I tend to have a strange revulsion, I have a thing called retropulsion.
I tend to fall backwards as I make my way, stealthily towards the top,
And then before I make it there, I take that perilous drop.

Before I make it up halfway, before I make it over the hump,
I find myself in a twisted heap, flat upon my rump.
It’s well beyond my understanding, how I seldom make it past the landing.
And all because they tell me my balance is impaired.
I am a Parkinsonian, I’ve trouble on the stairs.

And yet what am I to do, the stairs are everywhere.
It’s good that there are railings or I’d be in great despair.
I’ve learned to grab at one of these and pull upwards with all my might.
I hope the railings are secure, for it would be a dreadful plight,
To fall backward to my death from such a dizzy height.

Perhaps it’s all my lover’s fault, and he’s the one to blame.
What kind of fool buys a house with stairs, it’s such a fruitless game.
But I better keep my mouth shut or he’ll confine me to the second floor,
Or put me out upon the street to kvetch and vent no more.

Near a set of imposing steps is never good for me to be,
A staircase is a challenge, a near impossibility.
Yet upward I go, fearlessly, and likewise go my back hairs.
A fearless Parkinsonian, with trouble on the stairs.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

BENEFIT OF THE DOUBT

BENEFIT OF THE DOUBT

Sometimes I think my life is falling, head first down that slippery slope,
Past the point of no return, in the dog days of my horoscope.
Nothing left at the end of the abyss but detritus and dregs,
My soul is slipping fast away, it seems to have lost its sea legs.

And yet I keep on pushing forward, still I keep milling about,
Still content to give my life the benefit of the doubt.
Still trusting I will one day get it right, still hoping one day the stars will align,
Still hoping that the universe will send me some kind of hopeful sign.
Not knowing just how long I’ll wait before I give up hope,
Not knowing if I have the skills to carry on and cope.

Sometimes I think my friends are leaving me and leaving far too soon.
Out of the frying pan into the fire, the cow goes over the moon.
Swiftly, fruitlessly I do my best, to block their path and make them stay.
But desperation, it does not become me, and off they go on their merry way.

Yet I keep making excuses for them, still I keep the lantern out,
Still I give my cherished friends the benefit of the doubt.
Still trusting they will one day come, with their kindness and their merry talk,
Still hoping that like Jack and the giant we will climb that mammoth beanstalk,
And merge our fortunes into one, the cherished dawn, the rising sun.
Time will slow and then stand still, like roses in my windowsill,
And love will blossom yet again, for me and all my wayward friends.

Sometimes I think my doctors hate me, hiding things, leaving things unsaid,
That I am poor and stupid and a tad sick in the head.
Incapable of understanding the slightest little truth,
Sometimes I think my doctors are just a tad uncouth.
Sometimes I take to muttering, how in the hell can it be,
That time spent in their presence means so much money lost to me.
The great big gulf between what they do and the fees that they do charge,
A great big awesome mountain gorge, so gaping and so large.

Still I purse my upper lip and leave it stiff and hanging out,
Still I give my doctors the benefit of the doubt.
Still trusting they will one day learn to speak in terms I understand,
And unleash the science in their art, disease and its ravages safe in their hands.

Sometimes I think my life is falling, I hear the angels sweetly calling,
I hear the horns of heaven blowing and I hear God’s messengers as they shout,
I hear the sound of my own name being tossed and bandied about.
To the heavenly host I surrender the ghost, no more benefits of the doubt.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

CUTEST GUY

CUTEST GUY
(FOR KYLE)

The cutest guy I’d ever seen,
I found amid the pages of a gay male catalogue.
He seemed so quiet and unassuming,
But enveloped my mind in a lustful fog.

And as a late bloomer who had never known love,
A man of 37 who had never been kissed.
I on a whim decided it was time
To discover true love and all I had missed.

So, okay, it wasn’t a catalog, more like a dating game,
And my mind it wandered to the beauty of his name.
And though I never imagined myself with a gentleman named Kyle,
I thought of this sexy man with his grace and all his style.
So I swallowed the bullet, for he wasn’t cheap,
Almost two thousand dollars, I’m glad he wasn’t a creep,
Or a blond haired, blue-eyed pervert, sent by Satan to break my heart,
And rob me of my hard earned cash that was to be my retirement stash.

The night we met I will never forget, there in his luxury town home,
We went to Bob Evans for dinner,
A little early in the game for hands to start to roam.
He was charming, he was sweet, he made my days complete,
Never thought I’d meet a man who’d make me want to tweet.
But alas, these were days long before Twitter,
These were the Dark Ages, don’t forget, although I am not bitter.
I wanted him to take me home and eat me like an apple fritter.

It was a night I shan’t forget, he taught me how to minuet,
Okay, that was out of line, but it was a cheap and easy rhyme.
But later on we did go to France, though never did we actually dance.
Dancing for me an impossibility, unless I want to break my neck.
So I said I was tarred, played the Parkinson’s card, I figured what the heck.

He’s the cutest guy I’d ever seen and we’re together to this day,
Two boring serial monogamists going our merry way.
Ever since that fateful day with the gay male catalog.
When the cutest one I’d ever seen, enveloped my mind in a lustful fog.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

AWAKEN

AWAKEN

Freeze in the rain, bake in the sun,
But arise like the phoenix, awaken.
Jack of all trades, but master of none,
Arise to your glory, awaken.

Go where no one’s gone before,
Hang your shingle on the door.
Be where no one else has been.
Claim your prize through golden eyes, awaken.

In the maelstrom, in the sea,
Through every trial and adversity,
Be the person you knew you could be,
Though the fabric of life is thin
And you wear a coat of tin.
Arise, oil can in trembling hand, awaken.

Size up every struggle, nurture every dream,
Consciousness must be practiced,
Like the rivers flow to streams.
Meditate in stillness, the Buddha and his Zen,
Strike a pose in poet’s clothes, awaken.

King or queen of destiny, own your own mistakes.
And gravitate to your natural state, although your heart it breaks.
Through the glass you may see darkly now, as though life were a prison.
Reach through the bars where you can touch the stars,
There’s a future you have a stake in,
Arise from your slumber, awaken.

Through every last travail, in the midst of the hurricane eye,
See it through your narrative, as though it were imperative,
Chase down every answer like a hunter in the sky.
Chart your days with a traveler’s gaze,
To document just where you’ve been.
Beat the drum ‘til the chariot comes, awaken.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

CRACK IN THE FOUNDATION

CRACK IN THE FOUNDATION

It didn’t take a contractor with his demolition crew,
It didn’t take the OSHA man, in fact it just took you,
To find the crack in the foundation on which I built my life,
Rudderless and lifeless, like a shipwreck in the night.

And so I celebrate the legend, the tall tale and the myth,
Of how you polished up my soul ‘til it gleamed just like an amethyst.
How you sang away my sorrow with each imperfect note,
‘til now the ship is new again, just watch me as I float.

It didn’t take a salvage man with his massive wrecking ball,
It didn’t take three musketeers with their all for one and one for all,
To find the crack in the foundation on which I had staked my claim,
The loophole in the dotted line on which I’d signed my name.
A life that had all but washed away in the dirty burnt out sands,
A thirsty, parched and lonely pilgrim, traversing sacred lands.

It didn’t take an architect with his nouveau riche designs
Or a doctor with his stethoscope to see the deadly signs.
It only took your tender heart and your hands of tender grace,
To wash away the tear stains that had streaked across my face.

And so I raise my glass up high, upwards to the happy sky
That shines its light upon our days in a gentle golden glaze.
And makes my life as sweet as a chocolate meringue pie,
Silky and smooth, in a velvet groove ,with a cherry on top too.

It didn’t take a plumber, with his plungers and his drains,
Or the scarecrow who saved Dorothy with his newfound set of brains,
To find the crack in my foundation on which I’d staked my claim,
To find the hope in my horoscope, the beauty in my soiled name.

All it took was your tender heart and your hands that were gentler still,
To hold me gently as I shook, with the strength of your iron will.
It didn’t take a sorcerer or a witch with her tired and tainted brew.
To save me from my haunted self, all it took was you.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

DISABLE ME

DISABLE ME

Disable me, like an errant anti-theft device,
Disable me, like a broken piece of sidewalk ice,
Break me up in little morsels, quaint and bite size,
And look at me through compassionate bureaucratic eyes.

Disable me, before I blow my furious stack,
Leave me twisting slowly, like a criminal on the rack.
Disable me like a low down smoke alarm,
Devoid of proper functioning, devoid of helpful charm.

Disable me, before I have to fill out one more form,
To justify I need assistance, refuge from my inner storm,
Disable me, my mind is hazy, I may be going slightly crazy,
Disable me, feel my forehead, I feel a little warm.

I’m sick and tired of insurance, COBRA’s like a vicious snake,
And HIPAA’s like a loose woman, to cause your heart to break.
What earthly good is Medicare, when I need relief today?
And Medicaid won’t get me paid or my execution stay.

Disable me, disable me, before I cut my carotid vein,
And shower the world in a flood of blood, down on you like a rain.
Disable me, before I hurl, I’ve been thrown for a dreadful whirl.
Underneath the Mack truck’s tire, my white flag comes unfurled.

I surrender, I capitulate, I must surrender to my fate,
And throw myself down on my knees, beseeching social security,
For just a lucky Fate-drenched chance, asking me to slow dance.

Disable me, like an errant anti-theft device,
Disable me, aren’t you in the least bit nice?
Crack me like a hapless whip, before I fall, before I slip.
Before I bite, before I hiss and fall down off the precipice.
Break me up in little morsels, oh so quaint and bite size,
And look at me through sympathetic bureaucratic eyes.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

FISHING FOR ANSWERS

FISHING FOR ANSWERS

Fishing for answers, here in life’s stream,
Knowledge like a cancer, a bitter waking dream.
Finding out too late about all the things I lack,
Strength and ease of movement, they have gone and won’t be back.

Fishing for answers in my oversized canoe.
Separating fact from fiction, trading false for true.
Making use of tasty bait, the worm, the fly, the trusted hook,
Taking aim at the guilt and the blame, writing the final chapter and book.
Begging for a little crumb, careful not to ask for much,
Just an understanding ear, a kind and gentle touch.
A letter from the SSA, giving me the A-okay,
Manna straight from heaven, a health insurance copay.

Fishing for answers, in the heat of the day,
My blood, my sweat, my tears they fall,
Littering up the dusty way.
In the mood to graze the grass,
To eat the dirt, to raise the glass.
To swing like Tarzan from the trees,
Making mincemeat of my enemies.

Fishing for longevity, fishing for another hour,
Fishing for this grounded life to soar and open like a flower.
Fishing for the best in life, preparing for the worst,
In my rear view mirror is it my birthday or a hearse?

Fishing for an island on which to stake my claim,
A haven yet unspoken for, on which to place my name.
Sailing like a madman, over the bounding bay,
The ocean foam a pillow on which my troubles lay.

Fishing for answers, but coming up short,
Just like a lawyer who falters at court,
To the cold-hearted judge who holds a big grudge,
Holding the common man in contempt,
Leaving him bitter, unshaven, unkempt.

Fishing for answers, living with hope,
Trolling for treasure on a slick, slippery slope.
Finding out too late about all the things I lack,
I stumble from this burden I carry on my back.

Fishing for answers here in life’s stream,
Knowledge floats like cancer, a bitter waking dream.
Fishing for answers, the questions remain,
Brewing like a tropic storm, bracing for the hurricane.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

MORIBUND

MORIBUND

These days I’m not feeling well, like Satan on the coals of hell,
The fever’s high and getting higher, the prognosis it is getting dire,
The chills have come and the thrill is gone and I am feeling moribund.
All set to ride the long black train headlong into the driving rain or the burning sunset
Life is turning stark and dark and I am turning darker yet.

These years the days are gold they say, but there’s nothing good that can ever come,
Of dreams that fade to muted screams, of times that have turned moribund.
The coffin it is waiting and likewise groans the thirsty ground,
The crows they are circling, the deathly pavement they do pound.
The church is filling up with friends, the funeral home with flowers,
I have not been forgotten in these my final days and hours.
And perhaps I’ll leave a word or two to counsel or inspire,
Or a love poem in its sweetness, to stoke the waning fire.

But mostly all I have’s the past and its halls of harsh regret,
No one ever told me this was as good as it would get.
Stiff as a board, I cut the cord, of this empty barren shell,
And drown like Jack in his sloshing pail he carried to the wishing well.
The wishes and dreams have run amok and washed up on the nasty shore
Where tourists leave their trash and ash in a heap on the ocean floor.
A desperate ugly slush fund, that turns the whole earth moribund.
A withering witch, a dying slut, a wannabe male prostitute,
Who was never in the slightest handsome or barely even cute.

These days like some kamikaze sparrow I am falling,
To the epicenter of the earth, the voice of Satan calling.
A rare and lonely groundswell, that damns my soul to hell.
That takes a gun and kills the sun, that leaves me lost to everyone,
Drunk to the lees and on my knees, a man morose and moribund.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

LIFE IS WORTH IT

LIFE IS WORTH IT

Life is worth it so they say, the prophets and the seers.
Come ask me another day, for I am lost in tears.
Sometimes I barely see the sun, some days I hardly breathe.
This life is worth it mantra is a bit hard to believe.

Yet when I fly, I really fly and when I soar, I soar.
I find myself an eager kid caught in a candy store.
Everyone and everything is beautiful and sweet,
And just to be here one more day is such a special treat.

Life is worth it so they say, raise your glass and celebrate,
But this great celebration has come a bit too late.
Clothed in all my illnesses, staggering and sore,
Daring not to row my row boat too far from the shore.

Yet when I swim, I really swim and ace the American crawl,
And as my ship comes racing in, I revel in it all.
It’s up one day and down the next, that’s how the world does turn.
Always feast or famine, always freeze or burn.

We see the world through our filtered lens and think what we see is real.
it’s really smoke and mirrors, that from the past and future steal.
If we take a deep breath, slow down our hearts, clear our racing minds.
And sift some sand from the hourglass, who knows what we’ll find.

Life is worth it, so they say, it’s always worth the cost,
Come ask me another day, I’m rudderless and lost.
I guess it really just depends on your outlook and your frame,
And if we’re really honest we know life’s a kind of game.
Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose,
Sometimes you’re just a bit confused, as you traipse through the lonesome years.
Sometimes you don’t listen, while at others you’re all ears.

Life is worth it some days and others not so much,
It’s hard to be a so and so who’s doing such and such.
But plant your feet on this sacred spot that God has kindly granted,
And make a vow from here on out, to bloom where you are planted.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

JUST OUTSIDE THE COMFORT ZONE

JUST OUTSIDE THE COMFORT ZONE

I’m standing just outside your door, begging you to let me in,
To the wonderland of your embrace, the silky contours of your skin.
Here I stand, lost and alone, just outside my comfort zone.
The comfort zone that’s etched upon each line upon your face,
That pulls me in like a magnet to a warm and welcome place.

The world is bitter when you walk alone, freezing cold and miles from home.
And home is where you live with me, a treasured place for me to be.
This place is most secure, filled with your affection pure.
And I pass the hours midst the flowers, in a love that’s strong and sure.

I’m standing just outside your door, begging you to please forgive,
The twisted, tangled world of woe, the fog in which I live.
The times my thoughts have turned morose, my loose lips turned verbose,
You are my calm, my healing balm, the one I love the most.

Eager to receive your smile, that soothes and shelters all the while,
Eager to come inside, where your arms are close and open wide.
Where your lips beg to touch and linger with mine,
A song that is sung with a bit of tongue, go ahead and cross that line.
For me there will be no going back, you are the missing piece I’ve lacked,
And all around you emanates, the sweet fulfillment of my fate.

Once I stood a man alone, far outside my comfort zone,
Until you came and thrilled me with your kind and tender song
And drew me in like a long lost friend, to the place I now belong.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

CAPSIZED

CAPSIZED

Floating down life’s bitter stream, in my small canoe,
Like some awful waking dream, too sordid to be true.
A life that once was royalty, a life that once was rhapsodized,
The canoe is overturning, the banana boat has capsized.

My memory sparks with the fragments of who I used to be,
Back when the neurons fired with ease and great proficiency.
Living here with stupid, where once I lived with wise,
My demons gain the upper hand, my angels have been capsized.

The seasons turn and with them seems to turn my world,
The winter has engulfed my soul, its bitter winds unfurled.
I wrap the scarf around my neck as tight as a burial shroud,
But I can’t escape the fast approach of the teeming mushroom cloud.

It comes and taps me on the shoulder, spreading fast its fury,
And I am lost and I am tossed into the seas of worry.
Never sure and never secure, never knowing where my life is going,
The storm outside is now within, my heart is cold and snowing.
The misery is palpable, I’m listening to the blatant lies,
Of tongues that wag in unison, ‘til life is all but capsized.

Where have all the days of glory gone, headfirst into the sun,
I am in my corner of the world, despised by everyone.
Despised by some for who I am, by others for who I’m not.
Married to my misery, I take the plunge and tie the knot.

And sorrow is my newfound spouse, we live alone in this haunted house,
Stolen moments, remnants of joy, scurry away like a rabid mouse.
A life that once was glorious, a life that now is eulogized,
A heart that once was filled with promise, a heart that now lies capsized.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT

WHO WOULD HAVE THOUGHT
(FOR KYLE)

Who would have thought it would end this way,
At the close of the season, at the end of the day,
That I would find myself a man as glorious as you,
Who time and time again has proven to be true.

And who would have thought there was someone for me,
A man resplendent in both loyalty and beauty,
Someone whose smile can steal the moon,
And place it in my trembling hands like a helium balloon.
I hold it tight with sheer delight and dare not let it go,
Lest you fly away from me and into the clouds you’d go.

Who would have thought in the midst of disease,
In the midst of slow decline,
I’d find someone who’d steal the sun, and be forever mine.
Who would have thought that rubies red,
And roses red as valentines,
Would climb the trellis of my soul and stop the hands of time.

Your smile it makes the A-list,
Much more than a friend with benefits,
And who would have thought that a man like you could love a man like me,
And yet you came and called my name, softly and tenderly.

Your lips were meant for me to kiss, mine and mine alone,
And somewhere deep in the abyss, my nightmares they have flown.
To lie with you in stillness, just to know you’re there,
Is enough of a cause to stop and pause and praise a love so rare.
Who would have thought that in the end it would be this way for me,
That God would place you by my side, the perfect place for you to be.

Who would have thought that Fate had peered deep inside my heart,
And seen what it was lacking, an empty shopping cart.
And turned around and astounded and pierced me through and through,
Fate in the end became my friend and kindly sent me you.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

HERE FOR A REASON

HERE FOR A REASON

I fancy myself a man for all seasons,
I like to believe that I’m here for a reason.
Yet sometimes I still harbor doubts
And wonder what life’s all about.

Is life a race, is life a dream, is life a competition?
My mind it overflows with myth and superstition.
Is life a song, is life fragile, is life only what we see?
Do our senses deceive until we believe in heaven and eternity?

Is there a God to take us in his arms and hold us close when we cry,
And cradle us in his bosom sweet on the day on which we die.
My hunch is there is something more waiting just outside the door,
A land of new awakenings, a great and golden shore.
No one knows what looms in the distance and we seldom stop to ponder
To ponder on what lies ahead, obscured by the wild blue yonder.

I fancy myself a man who has a way with words
Who knows his way around the flowers and the birds.
Who walks attuned with Nature and all its mystery.
A man well versed in science, a man consumed with history.
Yet the more I learn about the past, the more I seem to just repeat it,
And end up feeling lost in space, dejected and defeated.
And all the things I thought I knew lie broken on the floor,
I find that I know nothing, a simpleton who longs for more.

More meaning in the struggle, more meaning to the fray,
The endless dramas we are caught in on each and every day.
Spirits loaded down with troubles, surrendering to Fate.
Until our lives pass quickly by and knowledge comes too late.

I’d like to be known as a man for all seasons,
I wish that I knew I was here for a reason.
All I know is I’m here today, that’s all I know without a doubt,
And I haven’t yet the faintest clue of what this life’s about.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

FIND THE GOLD

FIND THE GOLD

Find the gold in the winter cold,
The antidote pill in the feverish chill,
The shining light at the end of the rainbow,
At the end of the day when the sun sinks low.

Find the gold hidden beneath,
The tears and the woe, the sorrow and grief,
Turn over the stone, the bright colored leaf.
A world undiscovered, surpassing belief.

Find the gold, for without it you’re lost,
Your powers diminished, your signals are crossed.
You live in your bubble a man set apart,
Find the bright gold in your tired, tarnished heart.

Find the gold, for you feel yourself sinking,
Down that long slippery slope you slide without thinking.
Lost in the forest, a wandering child,
Barefoot and helpless, devoid of all style.

Find the gold that’s there in the hills.
When the night settles in with its consummate skill,
Find the gold on your wild windowsill,
Before roses die, before winter kills.

Find the gold that you’ve bought and you’ve sold,
Surrender the darkness that covers your soul,
The darkness that threatens to swallow you whole,
Before all your songs and your stories are told.

Find the gold on this roller coaster ride,
Find the gold on the road to suicide.
Like a leaping leprechaun dancing in the sunset,
Find the gold dream hidden in the sorrow and regret.
Find the gold in your gleaming lunch pail,
The yellow brick traversing your long and winding trail.
Find the gold like Dorothy did on her danger dipped trip,
Find the gold like Tiny Tim and tiptoe through the tulips.

Find the gold in the winter cold,
The antidote pill in the feverish chill,
The shining light at the end of your days,
That settles on your heart with a strange, burnished glaze.
The shining light at the end of the rainbow,
At the end of the day when the sun sinks low.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

WAITING ON THE MUSE

WAITING ON THE MUSE

Waiting on the Muse to come and hit me on the head.
Waiting for the Muse to come and kick me out of bed.
I am not the least confused on the thing that I should do.
I am one of the lucky ones, one of the privileged few.
Who roll in the lap of luxury, comforted by his Muse.

I pick up with flair my poison pen and know at once just what to write,
My wit is there at my command with a condescending bite,
And I cut the wise guys down to size with my quill pen and my ink,
And still have time to drink some wine and spare a thought to think.

Anyway the wind blows is all the same to me,
I blame not age or the wage I’m paid on lack of productivity.
I burn so hot just like a rocket, I up and blow my fuse,
But I take it all with a grain of salt,
A dry spell cannot be my fault, I blame it on the Muse.

Writing is as much a science as it is an art,
And sometimes I can be stupid when others think I’m smart.
Genius is part inspiration, part perspiration too.
I guess I’m wired to be inspired, I’m seldom left without a clue.
And I like to think I know my way around a rhyme or two,
But it’s never me, oh, no siree, it’s really just my Muse.

Sometimes the Muse is sneaky, sometimes crafty too.
It can flatter and beguile just like a clever child.
Sometimes it can throw a fit in the middle of the candy aisle.
But I am never at a loss, I can show the Muse who’s boss.
And if I cook a perfect dish, this culinary wordsmith,
All the words I think I choose are predetermined by the Muse.

Waiting on the Muse to come and strike me with his cane,
A crotchety ‘ole ne’er do well with only himself to blame.
The Muse will leave me high and dry, his servant I will gladly die.
When is not for me to choose, it’s in the hands of the mighty Muse.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

SO GOES THE DAY

SO GOES THE DAY

So goes the dastardly day, slinking over the misty mountain,
It knows that it’s done evil, spewing curses like a fountain.
So goes the day, leaving violence in its tearful wake,
A day that’s irredeemable, whose evil we can’t shake.

So goes the day, slinking like a petulant child,
Blatant, unrepentant, more than a little wild.
To its room in the land of wasted chance,
Where it does a cocky victory dance.
So goes the day, dressed in wicked array.

So goes the dusty day, slinking low into the dusk.
Leaving behind its scent of clover and of musk.
Slightly ashamed of itself and all it has done,
To quell the rejoicing, to silence the sun.

So goes the day, sorry for its misbehavior,
But clever enough to try and curry favor,
By promising a better version of itself tomorrow,
The new and improved, with half the sorrow,
Coming to your supermarket soon.
So goes the day, slow dancing with the moon.

So goes the day, sinking ever lower,
Losing strength as the night approaches,
Moving ever slower.
So goes the day with no apology.
Soaring in the sunset over the tops of trees.

So goes the day, in all its faded, hapless glory,
Another love song left unsung, another somber story.
So goes the day, its promise shot to hell,
Lying motionless behind the rainbow where it fell.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

COLD BLACK MIDNIGHT

COLD BLACK MIDNIGHT

At the end of my longest day, when sunlight disappears,
I weep this slow and sad parade of blue and silver tears.
Tears that coat the velvet lining of clouds that hold me tight,
And bring me slowly to the edge of another cold black midnight.

Night that drains the color from a dark man’s face,
And brings the ravens from their perch somewhere out in space.
Night that brings the fever and the everlasting chill,
Snuffing out the scent of hope and lunging for the kill.

A night can last forever when you go through it alone.
A hollow place of vapid space, a king without a throne.
A screeching hoot owl in the trees, a strange bone-chilling breeze,
A strange sadistic madman who loves to taunt and tease.

When night is your companion, you ply your solemn trade,
Like a lonely hunter, with bow and arrow splayed,
Ready to shoot out the moon if the loneliness will just subside,
Like a crazed and dangerous boatman on the tortured waves you ride.

When night is your companion, there is no turning back.
A cold and concrete dead end street, a lonesome cul de sac.
A bed that kills your aching spine, a chalice of the cheapest wine.
A sad and strange sensation of running out of time.

It’s a stormy cold black midnight, coursing through my veins,
That floods the rivers of my heart with its bitter acid rains.
Signaling the end of something, the death and the demise,
Stretching out in languid stillness across the weeping skies.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

JUST ONE MORE BIRTHDAY

JUST ONE MORE BIRTHDAY

Just one more birthday, and then I’ll go quietly,
Half a century old I’ll follow that light,
Into the tunnel from which there’s no returning,
Into Death’s icy fingers, into that snowy night.

Just one more birthday to spend with my lover,
Inside the cool sweet comfort of his gaze,
That look of clear concern in his eyes that cover,
Cover me in the sweet sad splendor of my days.

Just another 360 days and some change,
Just twelve more months to ride along this range.
Just one more year to spend in animated glory.
One more brief spin of the earth to finish my story.

Just one more birthday and then I’ll be gone,
Over the mountainside, to set with the sun,
To live with the sainted, my masterpiece painted,
My sorry life untainted by the chords of an unfinished song.
One more birthday before you can find me, rising to an eternal dawn.

Off in the distance Gabriel’s horn is blowing,
And a glimpse of eternity makes a strong showing
And tells me the time is approaching,
Mortality encroaching with each precious step,
These feet of clay they turn to stone, stubborn and inept.

Just one more birthday and then I’ll go willingly,
Tell Mr. Death that his henchmen have won,
Half a century of life on this planet,
I say fond farewell to my friends every one.

Just one more year and I’ll have had my fill,
Washed up, beaten down, destitute, ill,
Half a century old, I will follow that light,
Into Death’s echo chamber, into that final night.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

SPINNING

SPINNING

Spinning, spinning madly, out of control.
Just like a satellite, straight for the black hole.
The wide open black hole of space,
Falling so swiftly out of grace.

Spinning. spinning into the sun.
Lost to myself and to everyone.
Spinning, spinning blind to the day,
Spinning, spinning, so quickly away.

Preprogrammed to self-destruct,
I charge my way through the sands of time,
Detonated like some deadly bomb,
That falls without a warning sign.

Spinning, spinning, out of here,
Charting the course from far to near.
Spinning, spinning, life slips so far,
Here in my intergalactic car.

Preprogrammed to agonize,
I forge my way across tortured skies.
Like a slave to perpetuity.
Lost forever to the land of the free.

Preprogrammed to blindly fear,
Each mile of my journey here,
And happy to be tumbling far,
Far from the life of this lonesome star.

Spinning, spinning into space,
Quitting the amazing race,
Exiled to the furthest star,
My spirit bruised, my psyche scarred.

Spinning, spinning madly, a forgotten soul,
Like a whirlpool in a mixing bowl,
The wide open black hole of space,
Falling so swiftly out of grace.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

THE TRUST YOU STOLE

THE TRUST YOU STOLE

Your lips are dripping scandal, your lies fall in my lap.
Your claims hang looser than the tassels on a stocking cap.
You live with your impurities like rust stains in your blood,
Washed up upon a burnt out sea, a grave disastrous flood.

And you will never graduate, nor get your GED.
You’ll never bend to make a friend with truth or honesty.
And you will never ever live to make my venerable honor roll,
You are cold and distant as the faded trust you stole.

Your life is not the kind of life that I would care to emulate,
Your indiscretions mount and grow, you are always tempting fate.
You’re shrouded in your mystery, ignorant of your history.
Integrity eludes you, you are witty, you are droll,
But your promises are tarnished, like the wilted trust you stole.

In love with self, you raise the bar and set the standard higher,
The truth is raging to get out, it’s spreading like a brush fire.
You have no soul, no decency, no sense of human grace,
A crooked see through veil of smile is etched upon your face.
A victim of strange circumstance, you claim that you have no control,
Yet I am wise to your legion of lies that wash up like the trust you stole.

Are you done with scraping bottom yet, of scavenging the ocean floor,
For remnants of the man you were who is lost forevermore.
Like a white shark swimming in the dark you eat my spirit whole,
And your eyes are hollowed out and vacant, abandoned by the trust you stole.

A high school flunkee lost in his guile, walking the last exhausting mile,
You’ll never live to graduate or get your GED,
You’ll never stay to win the day with pure integrity.
You’ll never be around to make my venerable honor roll,
And your hands are coarse and brutal, tarnished with the trust you stole.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED


HELL TO PAY

HELL TO PAY

Satan’s asleep, out in the field, time to hit the hay,
Lucifer’s a tired old man, lots of evil fills his day.
Diabolical machinations, which empire should tumble and fall,
He owes a debt to no one, holds malice to the masses all.

So careful where you plant your feet, be mindful where you tread,
Watch your step and take good care or you may just end up dead.
The devil’s napping in the field, and evil’s kept at bay,
But wake him at your peril for there’ll be hell to pay.

Hell to pay for cheaters, hell to pay for the lying man,
Hell to pay for the fool who has built his house on shifting sands.
Stick to the true and trusted path, never trust a psychopath.
Less life explode, your world implode, and turn into a blood bath.

Hell to pay for the greedy, hell to pay for the callous ones,
Whose only concern is their own return, their day in the fading sun.
Stick to the true and the tried in life, never take a faithless wife,
And be transparent as the sun, walk only in the light.

Satan is slumbering, a light sleeper he,
Out in the field, better let him be.
Only a stupid fool at best would dare disturb a hornet’s nest,
For fear of dreaded pitchforks twisting slowly in the breeze,
Pestilence and famine, communicable disease.

Satan is slumbering, reloading his gun,
Best not disturb him, just turn and run.
Run for the mountains, head for the hills,
And plan your escape from a myriad of ills.

For a slow brief stretch of hallowed time,
The devil’s tired and kept at bay.
But rouse him at your peril, or there’ll be hell to pay.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

IN THIS LAMPLIGHT

IN THIS LAMPLIGHT

In this lamplight, dim but strong, I have plotted revolutions,
Settled scores and righted wrongs, my own brand of retribution.
In this lamplight of Egyptian soil or elsewhere on this sacred earth,
I have planned the death of tyrants and charted my rebirth.

In the lamplight underneath these eaves,
I have staked what I believe,
And fought and died for the sake of truth,
Gave up my beauty and my youth.
All not to die by a tyrant’s hand,
A bloody coup in a bloody land.

In the lamplight I have stolen lots of money from the poor,
Held in my Swiss bank accounts where I thought it was secure.
But ruthless men die a ruthless death, choking on their final breath,
And force does not trump liberty, when people get a taste of free.

In the lamplight I have dipped my pen in ink,
To pen a declaration,
Of independence that in a blink
Will descend upon my nation.
In this lamplight I have tempted both fellow man and Fate,
To hitch their wagon to my star in staunch pursuit of fear and hate.
Discrimination that has marked my homeland,
Be it a coastal town or a desert sand.
In the lamplight all for one, together we must stand.

In this lamplight secrets live and whisper their deceit
And in this lamplight echo forth the trampling of forgotten feet,
Whose footsteps leave a rogue’s spilt blood swirling in the mire and mud.
All for freedom and for freedom’s song,
I sing my message clear and strong.

In this lamplight, I have put my imprint,
On a new and vibrant government.
In the lamplight of a campfire strong,
I avenge my enemies, right my wrongs.
In the lamplight of this sacred land on this sacred piece of earth,
I have planned the death of tyrants and charted my rebirth.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

NOTE: For the people of Egypt and Libya, who inspired this poem.

SHARPENING MY WIT

SHARPENING MY WIT
(FOR JENI)

Sharpening my dormant wit, on the sweet jagged whetstone of yours.
Quick, sarcastic, beautiful, a delightfully sweet old bag,
A love that’s strong and oh so sure, you can really let that tongue wag.

Something about you caught my fancy, when we shared an office together,
George and Martha were our aliases, like the first Prez and his lady,
But oftentimes just to be cheeky we called each other baby.
Yet you had to have the last word, and cleverly called me Baby Doll,
I guess I kind of liked it or I’d have pinned you to the wall.
Well, all right, I wouldn’t have, I’m incapable of violence,
And you’re a pretty tough old broad, if that makes any sense.

How we clicked is anyone’s guess, but alas I do digress.
You seemed to like my people, the gays seemed to love you.
I would not call you a magnet for them, well, okay, yes, I would,
Your arms were welcoming, ever true, a guy could feel warm and understood,
And you had me from the day of my nasty fall at our place of biz
When you followed the ambulance to the hospital, not unlike the Wiz.
Except the road was not of yellow brick, it was merely dirty asphalt,
Though I would hasten to add the state of our highways is really not your fault.

And later on you lost your precious son, but kept his spirit tucked inside,
The silent portals of your heart, a heart that still stayed open wide.
So I bow to your excellence at coping, your subtle way of scoping,
Of ferreting out all the assholes life has cast in your direction,
You always find a new one to add to your collection.
And how I’d miss you were you not here on this turning earth,
Spinning your vignettes, as you smoke your pack of cigarettes,
Entertaining like a queen divinely holding court.
You are the droll, the deadpan one, the unassuming sort.

And Baby, how I love you, like our first Prez loved his lady,
But without that heterosexual stuff, you know that drives me crazy.
Sharpening my dormant wit on your sweet jagged whetstone,
And proud to say that we are friends, though we’re all in this alone.
In the end, our friends are all we have, and I know your friendship’s true,
My platonic valentine, my touchstone, there’s no one quite like you.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

NOTE: I wrote this for my friend Jeni for Valentine's Day. Love you, baby.

CROSSES TO BARE

CROSSES TO BARE

Let me bare my crosses tenderly for you,
Let me toss my travails in your general direction.
Let me bask in your attentions true,
Here in my room of right reflection.

And you can bare your crosses too,
And I will hang on every word,
And perhaps we’ll both feel just like new,
At long last understood and heard.

At times I feel so all alone, I scarcely leave this lovely home.
Sometimes it feels I’m losing ground, no friends or family around.
I feel bereft of human speech, my words they stammer and they slur,
I need someone to read my lips, the world becomes a blur.

Let me bare my crosses, I am surely not alone.
Adrift upon the lonesome sea, a misfit on his throne.
A has-been or a wannabe, come my heroes now to me,
And rest with me for just awhile, a respite from life’s lonely mile.

At times I feel I’ve lost the dream, ripped apart right at the seams,
I cannot remember my own name, I do not know just who’s to blame.
The better part of life is darkness, cold and damp and soggy.
The Zoloft barely makes a dent, just turns my poor brain foggy.

And disappointments mount, disappointments maim,
Disappointment I know like the back of my hand,
It’s become my middle name.
And people that I’ve trusted who I thought were true,
Have turned to phantoms from my past and vanished into blue.

Let me bare my crosses, naked as their day of birth,
And curse the misbegotten day on which I landed on this earth.
And let me wake to a world that understands my plight
Help me bear my crosses as I limp into that final night.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

LOVE TRIES

LOVE TRIES

Love tries its hardest to be valiant, to be forgiving, to be kind,
Love tries to always hit the target, Cupid draws his bow in time.
But love falters on the altar of pettiness and greed,
When lovers chance to differ on their wants and on their needs.

Love tries, a gallant foot soldier, to always fight the good fight,
To see the other’s point of view, to strive to make things right.
But love it fails so miserably, we stumble and we fall,
Dangling on the building ledge, love finally hits the wall,
And falls from grace like a lead balloon, just watch as it deflates,
The stress and strife of earthly life, gets in the way and complicates.

Love tries with its best and brightest colors, to charm and to beguile,
Love wears its false eyelashes, it winks at you, it wears a smile.
But in the end love topples hard, worn down by grief and pain,
A lonesome prairie brush fire, a tropic hurricane.
Love tries to hide astonishment, when bitterness raises its ugly head,
But gets caught up in selfish dreams and fickleness instead.

Love tries hard to right its wrongs, to see so clearly through the glass,
To forge ahead with newfound grace and to outrun the lonesome past.
Love comes so close to finish last in life’s amazing race,
Poised alas to crash and burn in a deadly high speed chase.
Love tries but seldom claims the prize, it’s a gamble at its best.
Love rises like a river, but careful when it crests.

Love tries, but lost in expectations, love is bound to fail.
Unless we try with open eyes to on its ocean sail.
Love tries, but soon divides, like an angry cancer cell,
Like a jellyfish upon the beach, like a crab emerging from his shell.
Like an octopus with tentacles, it strangles and it suffocates,
Love tries and vehemently denies, the thin line between it and hate.

Love tries, but in the end, only the strongest love survives,
Love tries, but soon it slowly dies, stranded until help arrives.
And help it always comes too late, such is life and such is fate.
Love tries but soon its muted cries sink beneath its crushing weight.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

JOURNEY'S END

JOURNEY’S END

I am weary to my bones, thinking of leaving, going home.
Surrounded by companions and loving friends,
I rise once more and take my bow, here at journey’s end.

My spirit cannot be contained, it longs to soar in the morning rain.
Unfettered and trusting, alive in the mystery.
The stream of a consciousness, the thread of a history.
My spirit it refused to break, and I refused to bend.
But the angels they came and took me away
At the end of my life’s longest day, to complete my journey’s end.

Purple horizon, golden glen, places I have never been.
Soaring ever higher o’er the rocky mountain.
Like some skilled and awesome bird,
Marveling at the unmatched word,
Showering me like a splendid fountain.

All that I could hope for, all that I could pray,
Was mine at last to treasure at the end of that longest day.
My earthly journey fraught with cares, my heavenly one a godsend,
That came to me so happily and eased my journey’s end.

The friends that came and knelt by my side,
And with tears but triumph in their eyes,
Sent me spinning in the eventide, in this final glorious ride.
Up to the zenith, up to the top, to a place that the earth in its slumber forgot.
But my soul it remembered and cried out with joy and freedom from its doubt.
I felt the holes in His hands and feet and like Thomas learned the lesson sweet.
The pleasure of blind faith and the sweet relief of calm belief.
And I was swept into God’s sweet arms, safe from turmoil and from harm.

I am weary, so alone, ready for my passage home,
Surrounded by my lover and my precious friends.
Set to rise and grace the skies, here at last at journey’s end.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

IN MY MEMORY

IN MY MEMORY

In my memory, the tarnished fragments of you linger,
Like some sad, sweet melody from a torchy nightclub singer.
The times we lived, the year you died, stretch across a burnt out field,
The times I stood my stubborn ground, the times you forced my soul to yield.

In my memory, the good times in a freeze frame, the bad all but abandoned,
A heart at once at peace with loss, but empty as a desert canyon.
Who says the dead leave and go anywhere once they leave our side?
You are a friend to the howling wind, you keep the prairie satisfied.
And though the years pass all too soon, like the fragments of a quarter moon,
They round up all my tears and lasso them to stillness,
Calm their jagged crystal edges, rescue them from willfulness.

In my memory, the decades spin into the cyclone,
Of friends I know will not return untouched unto this earthly home.
The time opens out in wide expanse to the cosmos and its hallowed dance.
Somehow the survivors lay their burden down and somehow carry on,
A little wiser, a little numb, from the place they’d once begun.
My memory the great sifter of the sands through which I’ve come.

It’s not the dead I sing for, but the living they have left behind,
Those who must make sense somehow of Fate’s great handiwork.
The search of a Sherlock for a clue to the Maker and his rhyme,
My memory is failing, in the labyrinth of His bread and holy wine.

In my memory, the gleaming torchlight of you lingers,
And for awhile you will remain, wrapped around my memory’s fingers.
Until we merge and then converge, soldiers of the dust,
And others they are left behind to bow their heads and ponder us.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED


Saturday, March 26, 2011

CLOTHESLINES, LAUGH LINES, AND CROW'S FEET

CLOTHESLINES, LAUGH LINES AND CROW’S FEET

Hang another pair of jeans out upon the clothesline,
Try as I might, they are far too tight, and that suits me just fine.
I cannot wear them anymore, my waistline keeps expanding,
I guess I’ve eaten way too much from the stress that life keeps handing.
Each day the world takes a chunk of my soul as it grows more demanding.

Strangely enough I still feel happy and far from incomplete,
I wear my laugh lines and my age spots well, I celebrate my crow’s feet.
Those strange sad wrinkles that sag with muted flair around my eyes,
Some say are a province of a soul both sad and wise.
I claim them proudly as my own, a trajectory that my life has drawn,
All the twisted weed strewn lanes down which my years have gone.
Time that’s lost to me forever to the ravages of my memory,
Time that grates and fascinates, as both a friend and enemy.

It’s clotheslines that are sagging for the outworn garb that does not fit,
It’s time to chill, to call Good Will, to make a good, clean break of it.
It’s laugh lines that are forming around these stoic lips,
The years have come and done their thing, yet still my spirit yearns to sing.
And I would not trade those laugh lines, though my youth they do eclipse.

It’s crow’s feet come like a coffin nail, to hammer home the truth.
Some things were not meant to last and one of these is youth.
I never shall be young again, the wrinkles they are everywhere.
The plastic surgeons all be damned, I guess I just don’t care.
With each passing year of time, my inner life grows more sublime,
And I guess the nugget I have learned is that I have richly earned,
Each sure, slow progressing sign of age that spreads with fervor across my face,
Clotheslines, laugh lines, crow’s feet, those outward signs of inner grace.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Saturday, March 19, 2011

HIGH CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS

HIGH CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS

It was not a high crime, it was just a misdemeanor.
So I ate a dried apricot from your bag of trail mix.
You don’t even like them, I could have been a whole lot meaner,
I could have taken an almond, or perhaps a pretzel stick.

It was not a high crime., it was just a misdemeanor.
I ran over your cat with the lawn mower,
She was so fast I didn’t see her.
And besides I would think you would keep her indoors,
Or at least upon her leash.
With me out operating heavy machinery,
You’re quite the one to preach.

It was not a high crime, it was just a misdemeanor.
So I drove your precious Acura into a snow bank.
The snow was cold, the car was old, unwieldy like a tank.
It was really not my fault at all, I blame it all on my disease,
The Parkinson’s, the cancer, I can’t remember which of these.
Perhaps it was the Alzheimer’s I’m really not for sure.
I have lots and lots of strange diseases for which there is no cure.

It was not a high crime, it was just a misdemeanor.
So I set the house on fire with my popcorn in the microwave.
You could have been a tad more gentle, you could have been a tad more brave.
Instead of fuming over losing a full eight hours of sleep,
And a ton of your designer clothes that were burnt and were not cheap.

It was a high crime not a misdemeanor, to ever say goodbye.
You were the sweetest man I ever knew with such beautiful blue eyes.
And now I sit a man alone in the prison of my years,
Shackled by my loneliness, condemned to a torrent of tears.

It was a high crime not a misdemeanor, and now I’ve learned my lesson.
With your boyfriend’s trail mix you shouldn’t go a ‘ messin.’
Or at least you do it on the sly and do not go confessin’.
Here I sit in a dreadful snit and I’m sorry I forgot,
To drive myself to Wal-Mart and buy my own dried apricots.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Wednesday, March 16, 2011

KEEPING SCORE

KEEPING SCORE

After all I’ve done for you, why can’t you do this for me?
We bargain with God or the universe for some sense of parity,
Yet sure as the bubbles in my tub that sometimes splash upon the floor,
Fate is murky and indifferent, and does not believe in keeping score.

God is not a referee in a tired old baseball game,
Like your favorite singer who you think knows you so well,
God can be a diva who scarcely knows your name.
And Fate can be a miscreant who damns your soul to hell.
We may as well not fight it, sometimes love goes unrequited.
Sometimes in love, one partner gives less,
Sometimes in love one partner gives more,
There’s little to be gained from the act of keeping score.

We fly for awhile on the wings of a smile, all is wine and roses.
But we never reach the promised land just like the punished Moses.
We reach home plate far too late, gasping out our final pleas,
After all I’ve done for you, why can’t you do this for me?

And yet it never works that way, we never fully understand.
God is not a street peddler, you cannot bargain with the man.
We live our lives with a child-like faith that borders on entitlement,
Then cry like babies in the crib when our days have all been spent.
All because we never learned when our feet first hit the floor,
God’s not an umpire in the clouds involved in keeping score.

I’ve watched friends come, I’ve watched them go, I’ve often questioned why,
Wondering if I’ll be a bargainer when it comes my time to die.
Will I ascend the heavens screaming it’s not fair?
Will I accept it stoically, with a calm and graceful flair?
Only God knows this for sure and he frankly doesn’t care.
He has bigger fish to fry than the meager death or life of me,
The sooner I accept it, the sooner I shall be set free.
No one knows the end of the dance, only Fate or random chance,
No one knows what waits in store.
Life is murky, life’s a crap shoot, life does not keep score.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Saturday, March 12, 2011

THE GREAT TENT SALE IS OVER

THE GREAT TENT SALE IS OVER

The great tent sale is over, wave goodbye to the auctioneer.
Say farewell to the unicorn and the rugged mountaineer.
They have all gone spinning across the spheres,
Somewhere out in the Milky Way,
Like some lonely vagrant year, like some weary, wasted day.

The great tent sale is over, bring down the lonesome canopy,
Yield to the strange cover of clouds that have silenced you and me.
Wave bye-bye to the man with one arm,
Who beguiled with his clever remarks and his charm.
And rode his unicycle over the moon,
He shan’t be back here anytime soon.

He has gone to the hinterlands somewhere far away.
Asleep in the land of poppies and psychedelic hay.
Ditto the double jointed fellow, the woman whose skin was a ghastly yellow.
Who fell victim to the drugs that shot through the needle,
Just like the midget who shot through the cannon,
Into the atmosphere, coming in for a landing.

The great tent sale is over, on to the next town,
With a brand new cast of characters that will not let you down.
The gap-toothed straw haired lanky lad
Who juggles sparklers and entertains.
The fearless loathsome hell of a hag,
Who does amazing things with pig brains.

The great tent sale is over, it’s back to school and back to work,
Or for those of us on a long, strange trip, it’s back to Planet Earth.
Say farewell to the painted ponies and the swirling carousel,
Leave your tarnished pennies in the bottom of the well.
And say a prayer for all of us in this freak show on this barren sod,
For there go you and there go I, but for the grace of God.

-Bruce Potts
Copyright 2011
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Saturday, March 5, 2011

WHIRLWINDS OF FURY

WHIRLWINDS OF FURY

Whirlwinds of fury, whirlwinds of dust,
Whirlwinds of failure covering us.
Like the lonesome Sahara, we are desolate and wild,
Renegade, petulant, just like a child.

Whirlwinds of fury, we are lost in the blur of drifting sand,
As it blows like the snowflakes across this barren land.
Too quick to fathom, too fine to see.
Whirlwinds of fury, engulfing you and me.

I never thought I’d say it, but I’ve lost my appetite,
For the howl of the coyote in the western skies,
Blanketing the night.
For the reassuring prick of the cactus,
The cowboy and his rope.
I’m here in hell without you,
Out of time and out of hope.

Like a shuffling unkempt mental case,
With a month of beard growth on my face.
I’ve abandoned all pretense of knowing how to live.
I’ve nothing left to offer you, no more dreams to give.

My eyes are tearing in the dark,
Remembering the cruel remark
He set off like a firecracker and then commenced to run.
Whirlwind of fury, blotting out the sun.

Whirlwinds of fury, blotting out time,
Past, present, future no longer are mine,
Death like a harpy inhabits my soul,
Waiting for his close up, nose in the air,
Pimping for the camera with a nonchalant flair.

Whirlwinds of fury whip through the canyon,
Then over the prairie, the topsoil goes sailing.
Somewhere around midnight the fire of the cannon,
Blows me apart, leaves me hopelessly flailing.

Whirlwinds of fury, whirlwinds of dust,
Whirlwinds of doubting where once there was trust.
Like the lonesome Sahara, we are desolate and wild,
Renegade, upstart, just like a child.

-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...