Category: Poems

When witch bottles
were in fashion
in the 17th century
protections against
evil spells and witches

a priest, Father Artemus,
schooled in occult sciences
heard many complaints
that the bottles of urine,
pins, needles and salt
didn’t work

he conjured up
a potent formula,
put it in a witch bottle

when left opened in
a house at night
would capture
a witch’s spirit
the witch’s body
would burn
to ashes

but his improved
witch’s bottle
vanished forever
7 days after he
invented it

the written formula
never found
father Artemus’s body
burned to ashes
a witch riding a broom
under a full moon
cackling and holding
his potent witch bottle.

Bob Boyd

When it was believed
evil witches
roamed the land
flew in the air
witch bottles
were everywhere
home security for
protection against
witches’ curses
“remedy for
flipping a
curse back
on the witch”
according to
English astrologer
Joseph Blagrave
urine, three pins
or needles
a pinch of salt
sealed in a bottle
got yourself
a witch’s
bottled repellent
safeguarded
against
their harmful
spells
their deadly
curses
their nightly
home intrusions

mummified cats
in walls too
often stuffed
in new homes
for additional
protection
against witches
everywhere
superstitions
run amuck
innocent women
out of luck.

Bob Boyd

Be there any human
with the unconditional
love of a dog?

As an observer of
humans for many
decades, I doubt there
is.

I doubt even Catholic saints
could come close

to that selfless love
that comes naturally
to a dog.

Bob Boyd

Just like we have fake news today
conning people into believing many lies
poisoning their minds with blatant untruths
I see a parallel between the word of mouth
and written news about witches yesteryear
when many innocent women were hunted
tortured and burned at the stake
that bogus belief repeated over and over
like a powerful mantra seeped into the
collective consciousness of superstitious
people making them believe in witches
it indoctrinated people like with dark arts
into torturing and murdering innocent woman
into enjoying and cheering when they
saw innocent women being burned to death
woe to all those complicit in that fake news
woe to those who murdered innocent women
true believers of the dark arts, fake news lies
and I wonder what happened to them
when they and that heinous fake news died.

Bob Boyd

On a radio program, heard a UFO researcher
say maybe aliens come from the astral plane

he claimed some people had even seen
deceased loved ones near UFOs

never heard that theory before
always thought any real or imaginary

denizens of an astral plane
could not traverse that plane into our world

the exception I could imagine is
astral beings appearing in human dreams

or disembodied spirits, ghosts and the
spirits of those who passed on

but not aliens allegedly appearing
concretely and abducting people

from out of the astral plane
instead of another planet or dimension

I find the concept of astral plane aliens
hard to believe

interdimensional I can accept
aliens appearing and disappearing into dimensions

but, perhaps, astral planes and other dimensions
are the same

which would give the UFO researchers belief
some credence

yet I just cannot believe aliens come from the astral plane
but what do I know? I’m no alien researcher.

Bob Boyd

An evil SOB, he sacrificed dogs to a demon
to attempt to get supernatural powers from it

after he sacrificed the 13th dog, a toy poodle,
he gained a single supernatural power –

the power to feel the spirits of the dogs he slaughtered
biting him mercilessly

the accumulation of those 13 dogs biting him
(painful as real bites), every day and night

shocked his mind and body to the point
he died from the trauma of the unrelenting pain

now he resides in a hell with the demon
he sacrificed those innocent dogs to

that torments and tortures him
relentlessly … unbearably … unendingly.

Bob Boyd

Walking along a solitary path
in a quiet woods

to walk off the depression
from the loss of a love

I spied a fairy-like woman
walking toward me

intending not to scare her
I didn’t walk close to her

I didn’t looked away from her
nor breathed a word

but she said, “Hey, you!”
and when I looked at her

her eyes met mine
imbued me with bliss

then she turned into a swan
and flew into

a sky that turned iridescent
for a minute

as the fairy turned swan
disappeared in it

my mind was totally blown
my depression completely gone.

Bob Boyd

Alas, where have those missed opportunities
with the right women taken wing to?

Why could I not have been wiser and
have intuited the right ones in my youth
and even in older ages?

Maybe that pretty one who kept looking at
me in that store next to our high school
when I was too dumb, too inexperienced,
to see she was into me.

Maybe she could have been the right one,
the lifetime love, I’d still be with today.

Perhaps that beautiful one who
was into me that I didn’t know about
till a friend of hers told me she was years later,
too late, when she was married to another.

Lord, how I wish like with a butterfly net
I could have netted one of those
missed opportunities and been with her
for all my life.

But, woe upon woes, I never did.
I only netted, or got netted by …
the wrong ones.

Bob Boyd

They burned her to death
on the Salem green
but, lo, the gods avenged her
those who lit the fire lit their fates
one went insane, the other died
his house in flames.

Bob Boyd

One possibly could think
the psychedelic images here sometimes
blog banners at that top of this page
that I conjure them while on drugs
like LSD or peyote Mescaline
such is not the case, far from it
I create them with my imagination
tweaks and an AI Image Generator
a partnership that often creates
images mind-blowing to me.

Bob Boyd

When she was young and heart-achingly beautiful
men everywhere looked at her with desire
desiring to be with what was the most beautiful woman
they had ever seen in their lives
most knew they’d never have a chance with her
they were sorely unworthy of her incomparable beauty
blessed was she with all the advantages of her looks
she’d even been discovered by a movie agent
while just strolling by herself down a boulevard
she had a decent showing in the movies
even starred in a few well received productions
but when she got a bit older in her mid forties
a director told her she was finished because
she was too old and nobody wanted to sleep
with her anymore and shocked she told him off
and left the superficialities of the Hollywood world
now no men ever look at her or desire her
they no longer want to be with aged out her
she often cries bemoaning the loss of her beauty
for her sadly it’s almost as if she had died
sad how nature is so cruel to beautiful woman
sad what it gives, it heartlessly takes away.

Bob Boyd

Pampered cats of the wealthy
have far better lives than most of us
no worries, no struggles to survive
no need to sometimes work
at jobs you dislike just to get by
often never having enough money
sometimes wishing for things
you will never be able to have
unlike those cats for whom money
and wishes will never be a problem
but we have an advantage over
most of all of those pampered cats
at least we have a chance at
finding true, romantic love
and I don’t know about you,
but I’d rather have that than
all those advantages of the
pampered cats of the wealthy.

Bob Boyd

I’m inserted into this lousy dream
I’m with a woman I don’t know
maybe one meaningful to me
all of a sudden I’m fighting
fighting with some rude guy who
offended the woman I don’t know
we’re fighting, fighting, fighting
no matter how hard I fight
this rude guy keeps coming back
back, back, back and back
I wake up annoyed, ticked off
that I had such a lousy dream.

Bob Boyd

Me, Jed and big Billy
drove up to the
Great Smokey Mountains
in North Carolina
to visit his hillbilly uncle
in big Billy’s new Chevy car
he loved like a baby boy

when we met his hillbilly uncle
a bearded old man
who looked like a wizard
he told us strange tales
about creatures called dogmen
and said to not go into the forest
if we wanted to live

his crazy talk about dogmen
his freshly made moonshine
flowed all through that day

I have to admit the old man’s
crazy talk was entertaining
his moonshine was good
better than Budweiser beer

but the wooden crosses on the doors
the windows all over his house
and the two around his neck
were a bit much

but all the crazy talk became real
when we heard the heart stopping howls
coming closer and closer from
somewhere deep in the forest
scared, we peeked out the windows
saw three huge, godawful creatures
half human half dog, glowing red eyes
sounds of growling
the beasts creeping out of the forest

when they reached the old man’s house
they started smashing big Billy’s
brand new Chevy car
they banged on his uncle’s
front door

big Billy drunk on his ass
not afraid of anything
pissed off about what
the dogmen were doing
to his brand new Chevy car
grabbed his uncle’s ax
next to the wood and
the crackling fire
in his uncle’s fireplace

charged outside
began swinging that
ax like a madman at the
three dogmen

until one of them
clawed his head off
and they carried big Billy’s
headless body into the
darkness of the forest
behind his uncle’s house

we asked big Billy’s uncle to
call the police, but he said
that won’t do no damn good

the police ain’t gonna mess
with them dogmen
they know the dogmen
will kill them too
and they have wives
and youngins to feed

we called the police anyway
reported what the
dogmen did to Billy
nothing the police could do

in the distance deep
in the forest
the howls started again
scared out of our heads
trembling uncontrollably
about to piss our pants

we scrambled outside
jumped into big Billy’s
banged up and dented
brand new Chevy car
jump-started it and
got the hell out of there.

Bob Boyd

A beautiful face
lovely, long black hair
a voice sweet and mellow
alluring as a siren’s call
impossible to ever imagine
one day she’d conspire
to have her rich loving
husband offed
5 million dollars
in insurance money
the bloody pay out
her husband dead
her plot revealed
she rots in jail.

Bob Boyd

You were healthy as a horse in your unbridled youth
health concerns and medical problems minor or rare
when it came to your health, rarely a care

but when you got old and became like an old mare
health concerns and health problems began to pile up
doctors and hospitals, a staple in your aging life

and you wondered where the golden years were
except for all the gold your medical problems cost you

the worst was when the medical bills started filling your mailbox
or bombarding your computer emails nearly every month
and your body kept breaking down with medical vexations

or you had to move to a medical facility because
you no longer could take care of your debilitating self
and the costs became exorbitant and you went broke

unless you were one lucky old salt who maintained
perfect health until you died solvent in sleep
without piles of medical bills and medical maladies
like when you were young and healthy as a horse.

Bob Boyd

The flowers are starting to die
winter’s not far away
like elderly humans
with death not far away.

Bob Boyd

Warmongers safe from wars
far from the battlefields
unconcerned about the cost
of human lives

indifferent to the decimation
of populations of peaceful people
caught up in wars

wars no longer a worthwhile gambit
a crap shoot with the real risk
of a nuclear Armageddon

nobody wins, everybody loses

an incomparable, unimaginable obliteration.

Bob Boyd

Many are the reports of cryptid sightings
Bigfoot, Dogman, Mothman, Jersey Devil, etc
but there’s a problem with the proof
that these unusual creatures are real
the alleged sightings are in the thousands
last I read, 75,000 for Bigfoot, popular fella
but there’s a problem with the proof
maybe the reason is these cryptids
are not permanent features in this world
but intermittent visitors from other dimensions.

Bob Boyd

Don’t know if you were real or not
but oh what a dream!
we just spent some time together
not even a caress or a kiss
but oh what a dream!
it felt better just being with you
than others I’ve caressed and kissed
just your presence was more comforting
more pleasurable than being with them
too bad we only met in a dream
and you were probably imaginary.

Bob Boyd