Category: Poems

She was like a radiant lily flower
She had that kind of shining beauty,
cornflower blue eyes and luxurious blonde hair,
wavy and below her shoulders
that could make a man gasp at the sight of it.

For two teenage summers she was my girlfriend
and we vowed one day we would get married.
But I should have known it would never last.
I was from the working class. My father worked in a factory.
She was from the middle class, her father an executive.

She was off to college. I didn’t have the grades or the money.
She became a homecoming queen. I became a jilted wreck.
when she left me for a rich college kid with the right pedigree.
Lived my life like a crazy man after that, not caring about anything.

Took me years to put the pieces of my heart back together.
I wasn’t as strong back then as I should have been, as I became with the years
and the knowledge that must people have broken heart moments
and disappointments as they travel on the mystery tour of this uncertain life.

Bob Boyd

She told me she was a black magic witch.
She said she had demonic familiars
that she could unleash on anyone
who met with her displeasure

I knew her when she was a Catholic girl,
always sweet and devoutly religious.
I wondered what went wrong with her
until I learned that madness ran rampant in her family.

I was saddened but not entirely surprised
when she had a psychotic break with reality
and had only imaginary black magic powers
minus any demonic familiars.

I never saw her after the break down,
never heard a word about her as if she vanished
and I often wonder what happened to that
formerly sweet and devout Catholic girl.

Bob Boyd

Too many loves that didn’t work out
plagued her life with sorrows and disappointments.
Two marriages that after years ended in divorce,
controlling men who turned out to be insufferable.
After decades of never finding lasting love
at seventy years of age she gave up on men and love.
Spent her final years with grandchildren and watching TV
to try to fill her elderly years with substitutes for romantic love.
But sometimes when she was alone and away from her grandchildren
and nothing good was on TV, she’d feel a stirring, a need for romantic love.

Bob Boyd

Brianna had a special kind of magic
the way she could make people shine
with the power of her praise.

Like Christmas lights turned on
at Christmas, smiles would light up their faces
when she said nice things to them.

Even old Mrs Guttenheimer, who rarely ever smiled,
glowed when Brianna complimented her.

She had the greatest interpersonal skills
everyone who knew her said.

But she let everyone down when she became a con artist
and scammed friends and rich investors out of millions.

Now she’s in San Quentin despite her interpersonal skills
that didn’t save her from a long prison sentence.

Bob Boyd

beneath the soil
exists a wood wide web
a network between
plant roots and fungi
carbon is giving the former
nutrients to the latter
and in the wood wide web
when one plant is attacked
the other plants know it
pity they cannot
defend themselves
like the fearsome
venus flytrap

bob boyd

You go through your life
as if you’re on earth forever
you forget that
you’re only here temporarily
and that at any moment
what happens only
to other people
can happen to you

until that day arrives
when you are that
other person
and a tragedy strikes
and you find yourself
in a hospital bed
for the first time in your life
except when you were born

and the truth hits you
like a sledgehammer
that you are clinging to your life
like you never imagined

and you wake up
to your impermanence
in this unpredictable world

and you start praying
fervent foxhole prayers
hoping God will somehow
spare your tenuous life
before the lights go out

and you are no longer
the other or any kind of person

and maybe if the
wondrous near death
experiences reports
are really true

you become alive
in the eternal afterlife
and meet the real you
imbibing the cosmic bliss
of unending unconditional love

Bob Boyd

according to a website
singular fortean
mothman has appeared
again
on a condominium
rooftop in chicago
witnessed by
a man named ryan
who said he saw
a humanoid creature
with eyes like lights
that unfurled its wings
and flew off the rooftop
and vanished into
the night

it’s probably just nonsense
a bogus hoax
instead of being legit
but either way
I don’t care
for me it’s just fun
and a break
from the mundane

bob boyd

the world over women wear makeup
it amazes me how it seems instinctive
programmed into the female psyche
to attract a desirable partner

it may be just all for procreation
the continuation of the species
like it is for all the other species
seemingly without romantic love

this makes me wonder if it’s all
only for keeping the river of
millions and millions of people
continuously populating and flowing

I’d rather it was all for romantic love
and that this romantic love continued
unbroken and forever in the afterlife
but sometimes I wonder what the
makeup and the love is all about

bob boyd

it is said too many cooks spoil
the broth
it seems that applies to politics
with politicians who are
opportunists
in office mostly to get rich
on the taxpayer’s dime
with politicians with agendas
not in the interest
of the people
infighting instead of
team building
at the expense of
the common good
thankfully some politicians
are patriots
not in office to get rich

bob boyd

millions are born
millions die
planets keep spinning
the world keeps turning
everything keeps churning
everything is in motion
like the gears
in a cosmic machine
the question is
precisely who or what
turned it all on
or was it self automated
in some unfathomable
mysterious manner

bob boyd

he was trouble in high school
from getting hit too much at home
didn’t take crap anywhere else

he acted up in every class
except in one study class
where the teacher was elderly
and exceptionally nice to him

he got kicked out of school
many times for bad behavior
he was too rebellious and
rarely did any homework
he barely graduated D’s and F’s
college wasn’t in his future
bad grades poor family

he went into the air force
was a bad actor there
couldn’t fit in with the rules
and all the enforced conformity
got drunk and troublesome
confined for 30 days under guard

had an epiphany while confined
saw it was him and not them
began to reinvent himself
took colleges courses A’s & B’s
returned home from the air force
a peacemaker and a matured man

spent his final days helping
the elderly with a nonprofit job
received praise and accolades
the last an award from a college
for his achievements with the elderly

bob boyd

A skylark sings songs while it flies
I wonder what it’s singing about
Maybe the fun and the freedom
Of flying so high in the open free sky
Above the earth liberated from gravity
Above the planet’s cares and concerns
Maybe the skylark gets high when it flies
An intoxicating rush among billowing clouds
I’d like to feel what the skylark feels in flight
And sing like it high in the open free sky

Bob Boyd

You might never have heard of me
That’s why I’m here
A 15th century pope tried to
Erase me from history
Because I was opposed
To the sinful excesses
In 15th Century Florence, Italy
I fought the good fight with
My bonfire of the vanities burning
Objects denounced as occasions of sin
Vanity items, mirrors, dresses,
Cosmetics, musical instruments
And more that tempted one to sin.
For my pure and Christian efforts
And my justified defiance of
Licentious Pope Alexander the VI
I was excommunicated and
Hanged to death, my body
Burned to ashes in
Florence Square.

Bob Boyd

on my youtube playlist
Paul Davis is singing
to a woman about
coming over tonight
and how he wants
to hold her by
the firelight

and I’m thinking though
old school romantic
songs are my absolute
favorites maybe they’re
not good for me

I start remembering
how a woman coming
over and holding her tight
can be such an ecstatic
experience beyond
most experiences a
man can ever have

and despite being kinda
like a monk I find myself
slipping into a reverie
where i find myself
missing all that and
forgetting that what
first seems sweet can
eventually turn sour

and I start thinking
about the beautiful
concept of soulmates
and how I never met
mine no way no how
and I think that maybe
just maybe those who
who don’t find their
soulmates in this life
find their soulmates
in the afterlife

then I come to my senses
calm down and accept
my never met a soulmate
fate like so many others
and get this zenlike
attitude and accept
things as they are and
go back to being kinda
like a monk

bob boyd

I was living near Harvard U
when I sped a handout
about a meditation group
run by a famous guru
it was at Harvard U
but open to the public
7 pm on a Thursday

met a tall blonde-haired
guy named Woody there
who ran the group
seemed like a kindred soul

I said, “Where’s the guru?”
he said, “in Europe, but
you will feel his presence
when the meditation starts”

I wondered if he was just
saying something akin to
he’ll be here in spirit but
you won’t feel a darshan

they had a photo of the
guru on a table between
two burning candles

at 7 pm kaboom! the room
lit up with phenomenal
pease and incredible bliss

I got more blitzed than
I’d ever been before
from any spiritual method
I’d ever tried

Woody told me followers
of the guru would feel his
spiritual energy blasting
into them every night
and waking them up

I went back to that group
a few more times
one time after the
guru’s energy blasts
I was driving home
and was so spiritually
high that when the
muffler fell off my car
it didn’t matter

my consciousness was
so stratospherically high
that what would have
bothered me no end
didn’t matter one bit

I was beyond most
earthly cares

one night I meditated
on the guru’s photo
saw him in a dream
he touched me on
the top of my head
I think as an invitation
to become a follower

I never became one
he demanded celibacy
and I was too much a
romantic to forego that

surprisingly, shockingly
years later that uber
powerful guru got caught
up in sexual scandals
like many gurus who
came to america

most were impressive
but predatory with
young women

after reading about
so many of those
charismatic gurus
preying on so many women
I left eastern spiritual
practices and never
returned

bob boyd