The way you wear your hair
The way you smile
The way your voice is uniquely pleasing
The way you are enjoyably mellow
The way your personality is enchanting
The way you are spontaneously funny
The way you have a lovely fashion sense
The way you are always cheerful
And the way you are a delightful person
Who gladdens many hearts
And makes everywhere you are so wonderful.

Bob Boyd

Don’t know where I heard this
and I’m probably misquoting:
“Sweet bird of youth
where have you flown?”
But it clearly captures
the temporary nature
of one’s younger days
that can seem like they
will last forever when
you are young and oblivious
to your youthful days running out
that bird of youth soon to fly away.

Bob Boyd

Nurses amazed
saying I look like 60
instead of 80
one said
no wrinkles
on my face
compliments always
welcome at an
age when fewer
compliments happen
like delicious
self-affirming morsels

got to meet
many caring
and inspiring
medical people
kidded around
with some
humor and fun
always good
beneficial to the mind
body and soul

what to you
would probably be
a dreadful experience
was for me socialization
and an enjoyable
learning experience.

Bob Boyd

Heart implant done,
everything good
not a problem
a heart enhancement

what could seem
sad or tragic to you
an opportunity
for more growth
to me

and surprisingly
I always get
a Zen-like
C’est la vie
acceptance
in moments like this

besides I can keep
working out
riding my exercise bike
2 hours daily
writing poems
2,500 in under 2 years
shooting for 10,000
before Grim ushers
me into the higher life

besides none of this is lasting
in this impermanence

I’m just a sojourner here
standing in line
to board the good ship
permanence
devoid of the uncertainties
suffering and evil
in this transitory existence

or maybe come back
become fully enlightened
a spiritual powerhouse
with powerful emanations
and spiritually and
physically help countless people

this poem is about far more
than inconvenient
or even tragic earthly matters
it’s about acceptance and
an eventual liberation
from the woes and worries
of this impermanent world.

Bob Boyd

The heart doctors tell me
two chambers in my heart
one on top
the other on the bottom
are not talking to each other
electrical communication
between the two
in a healthy heart
in my heart
the bottom chamber
is not communicating
with the the upper chamber
a pace maker has
to be implanted in my heart
a heart implant today
a brain implant tomorrow
so my lower self can communicate better
with my higher Self.

Bob Boyd

Lying on a hospital bed
at Moses Cone hospital
Greensboro
wires attached to my body
on small circular pads
one attached to my
right index finger
I’m feeling like a human machine
with all this wires extending out of me
Lying on a hospital bed
at Moses Cone hospital
Greensboro
wires attached to my body
on small circular pads
one attached to my
right index finger
I’m feeling like a human machine
with all this wires extending out of me
maybe they’ll supercharge my body
maybe they’ll upgrade my mind
and give me super strength
and stupendous psychic powers.

Bob Boyd

Sitting in the ER
intermittent chest pans
might be from
1. a chest muscle strain
2. too much phlegm
3. signs of a heart problem
hoping for 1. or 2.
who wouldn’t be?
given 3 medical tests
ironically 3. failed
them all
now a nurse casually says
we’ll find you a bed
silent mayday alarms
go off in my head
a stay at the hospital
a heart problem
has come down the pike.

Bob Boyd

In her youth she was always happy
had lots of fun friends
partied and laughed a lot
in her young and exciting life
now she’s a 90-year-old lady
and the friends are gone
all dead
she’s alone now
the laughter gone
unhappy and depressed.

Bob Boyd

11-year-old Alice Glaston
From Little Wenlock
Arrested in 1546.
No one knows anymore
What she was on trial for.
Hung alongside two grown men.
In Henry VIII’s England.
In Much Wenlock,
Shropshire, England
in 1546.
The reason, the crime
real or contrived
forever lost in time.

Bob Boyd

The Battle of Agincourt
Henry V had
6,000 to 8,000 men
Charles d’Abret
15,000 to 16,000
English longbow archers
Saved the Day
Despite the overwhelming
Three to one odds
Thousands of arrows
That darkened the sky
Evened the odds
Awarded the English
The impressive win
5,000 plus French dead
Only 600 English Dead
What a terrible price
For all who died
What a horrible waste
Of so many human lives
Though it was glorious
A win against great odds
It’s a reminder of ravages
Of the cost of wars
The untold numbers
Of dead human lives
If only our species
Didn’t have to have wars
From its ancient origins
To the wars today.

Bob Boyd

The solicitor stops at a village near Count Dracula’s liar.
The villagers cross themselves at the mention of Dracula.
They warn him of the horrors at the castle.
He blows their warnings off as foolish superstition.
And you know, it’s to his coming peril.
A wise man would have dialogued with the villagers,
investigated their claims of werewolves and vampires.
Heeded their well meaning warnings.
Felt the portents in their words.
Sensed the horrors at the castle.
Pulse and heart beat quickening,
he would have prudently turned back
and saved himself and his mortal soul
from the terrors that awaited him that dark day.

Bob Boyd

The cold season is nearing now,
61 degrees today.

Like a warrior before a war,
I’m prepared for it.

And I’m looking forward to
the increasingly colder days.

Though I’ll shiver a time or two
and get chilled a bit, almost to the bones.

I’ll survive the worst of the winter cold
with little use of heat

and enjoy the invigorating effects of the
stirring winter chill.

Bob Boyd

When I was in grade school and high school
teachers always told me and my classmates
fighting is wrong, don’t do it.

At some point, I became aware of all the adults
fighting wars and found what the adult teachers
said to be hypocritical.

Here they were setting a standard that grown ups
failed to follow all over the world.

Now many, many decades beyond childhood,
I stopped fighting ages ago when I was a young man,
but I find it disturbing that adults are still fighting.

I find it disturbing that we still have wars, and
adults are still fighting and even dying in wars
all over the world.

And I wish when my teachers told me and my
classmates fighting was wrong, don’t do it,
that adults all over the world took their advice.

Bob Boyd

A wonderful ride
hollywood stardom
fame fortune glory
all her dreams
more than fulfilled
renowned actress
two husbands
two lovely kids
until she grew
older and her
ride slowed down
and the dreams
were ended
as well as the fame
and Parkinson’s
destroyed her life
erased her past
at age eighty-six
when her ride
screeched to a halt.

Bob Boyd

Wild nights
Crazy days
Wasted youth
Troubled past
Missed opportunities
Unretrievable
Cannot relive
The better life
He could have had
If he’d been
Less troubled
Less rebellious
Better behaved
Hit less times
Less screwed up
Model teenage kid

Bob Boyd

When I was a child
maybe under age ten

grasshoppers were a phenom
the way they could jump

the way some of them
could fly a bit

I cannot remember the
first time I saw one

I kind of wish I could
retrieve that wonder

recapture that amazement
remember that joy

but I’m an old man now
and such memories are gone

amazing childhood moments
I cannot relive.

Bob Boyd

He said he’d
been abducted
by aliens
the reptilian kind
they examined
and probed him
he said he
got the works
but failed to
qualify what
the works meant
he did seem
different
maybe the works
meant an upgrade
of his brain
then he said
one day he’d
join the aliens
on some kind
of shangrala
distant planet
he died soon
after that
a week later
I saw him in
a dream playing
golf, his favorite
pastime, with two
reptilian aliens
in a surreal
and paradisiacal
planet on a
brilliant green
glowing golf
course
maybe it was
just a dream
maybe not.

Bob Boyd

As he keeps reading
the cosmic energy
keeps increasing
in his head
like a basketball of
subtle energy inside
and around it
like those pictures
of halos
in eastern orthodox
icons
but he is not holy
nor is he unholy
he just is
he just is subtle energy
his consciousness
confined temporarily
within a brain
ot neurons
and glial cells
within a flesh
and blood body
with circuits of
blood vessels
circulated
through it
he is patiently
awaiting the day
when the he that
is a small part
of higher Self
can be united
with Self again.

Bob Boyd

he sees a movie with two beautiful starlets of the past
in it

one died in her forties of cancer

the other in her sixties of heart problems

he is sad their beauty and their lives didn’t last
except in their movies

at least they had that

he ponders how when he dies he won’t have
any remnants of his life on earth

he realizes as the years speed by
the tens
the hundreds
the thousands
and more

nobody will have any remnants of who they were
or what they did

it’s as if it’s all illusionary
or just a dream
this passing life
this ever ending
impermanence.

Bob Boyd

No woman in my life
Withdrawn from humankind
Spiritual energy streaming up in me
nonstop permanently
like a Hindu monk charged up with shakti
every day and every night
like a recluse basking in spirituality
waiting for the final release
hoping for the maha samadhi
the world no longer owns me
I yearn for the higher life
the sat chit ananda
the real home of this aging soul
unconditional love, eternal bliss

Bob Boyd