ROADSIDE GRAVE

ROADSIDE GRAVE

Give me a simple funeral,

And dig me a roadside grave.

I am happiest in the company

Of the fool, the rogue, and the knave.

I was never one to sit and debate

What Shakespeare really meant.

I really couldn't care one whit less,

What was the Bard's intent.

I loved the beauty of his words,

They had a magic all their own,

Appealing to the common ear,

Yet strangely numb to the scholar's drone.

So bury me with the ordinary,

The orphan and the widow,

With a bed of tulips solitary,

That can be seen by the bedroom window.

Where I sat and wrote these final words

In my puffy profound middle age.

Do not shed any crocodile tears

As I turn and exit the stage.

I leave behind a body of work

That I pray speaks for itself,

And I would rather be read and enjoyed,

Than to gather dust on some ancient shelf.

English majors all be damned,

In the end a simple man is really all I am.

So bury me by a roadside motel

Or a house of ill repute,

In the end it's all the same to me,

A railroad grave would also suit.

But nothing ostentatious, nothing just for show,

Perhaps some hopeless mound of earth

Behind the train depot.

Just leave me a little breathing room,

Place some violets on my tomb.

Better yet, scatter my ashes in some bright and sunny meadow,

For I am claustrophobic and fear the final shadows.

Just give me a simple burial

And dig me a roadside grave.

I am happiest in the company

Of the fool, the rogue, and the knave.

-Bruce Potts

Revised Copyright 2015

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED