Tarantella
Do you remember an Inn,
Miranda?
Do you remember an Inn?
And the tedding and the spreading
Of the straw for a bedding,
And the fleas that tease in the High Pyrenees,
And the wine that tasted of tar?
And the cheers and the jeers of the young muleteers
(Under the vine of the dark veranda)?
Do you remember an Inn, Miranda,
Saturday At The Canal
I was hoping to be happy by seventeen.
School was a sharp check mark in the roll book,
An obnoxious tuba playing at noon because our team
Was going to win at night. The teachers were
Too close to dying to understand. The hallways
Stank of poor grades and unwashed hair. Thus,
A friend and I sat watching the water on Saturday,
Neither of us talking much, just warming ourselves
By hurling large rocks at the dusty ground
And feeling awful because San Francisco was a postcard
A Boy Named Sue
Well, my daddy left home when I was three,
and he didn't leave much to Ma and me,
just this old guitar and a bottle of booze.
Now I don't blame him because he run and hid,
but the meanest thing that he ever did was
before he left he went and named me Sue.
Well, he must have thought it was quite a joke,
and it got lots of laughs from a lot of folks,
it seems I had to fight my whole life through.
Ode To The Book
When I close a book
I open life.
I hear
faltering cries
among harbours.
Copper ignots
slide down sand-pits
to Tocopilla.
Night time.
Among the islands
The Owl And The Pussy-Cat
The Owl and the Pussy-cat went to sea
In a beautiful pea green boat,
They took some honey, and plenty of money,
Wrapped up in a five pound note.
The Owl looked up to the stars above,
And sang to a small guitar,
'O lovely Pussy! O Pussy my love,
What a beautiful Pussy you are,
You are,
You are!
A Woman's Shortcomings
She has laughed as softly as if she sighed,
She has counted six, and over,
Of a purse well filled, and a heart well tried -
Oh, each a worthy lover!
They "give her time"; for her soul must slip
Where the world has set the grooving;
She will lie to none with her fair red lip:
But love seeks truer loving.
She trembles her fan in a sweetness dumb,
Poetry Heaven
Last night I went to bed at eleven
And dreamed I went to Poetry Heaven.
Keeper of the Gate was not Saint Peter
But Robert Frost - - hey, what could be sweeter?
The first person I saw up there
was sitting in a golden chair.
It was my good friend, Hank Beuning,
And a golden guitar he was tuning.
*** I Got The Blues For You ***
Pelican blues, jay walking on velvet souls
Somber and detach, mayhem
Pickering the night of pre dawn
The choir of your anger, screaming
In tune to the decaying sounds
Of the strings Silverado
Ascending in D Minor
Descending in G Major
Flavor never a waiver
Impacts……….heart raptures
‘march Days Return With Their Covert Light’
March days return with their covert light,
and huge fish swim through the sky,
vague earthly vapours progress in secret,
things slip to silence one by one.
Through fortuity, at this crisis of errant skies,
you reunite the lives of the sea to that of fire,
grey lurchings of the ship of winter
to the form that love carved in the guitar.
O love, O rose soaked by mermaids and spume,
dancing flame that climbs the invisible stairway,
Death & Fame
When I die
I don't care what happens to my body
throw ashes in the air, scatter 'em in East River
bury an urn in Elizabeth New Jersey, B'nai Israel Cemetery
But l want a big funeral
St. Patrick's Cathedral, St. Mark's Church, the largest synagogue in
Manhattan
First, there's family, brother, nephews, spry aged Edith stepmother
96, Aunt Honey from old Newark,
Doctor Joel, cousin Mindy, brother Gene one eyed one ear'd, sister-
Bold As Love
Once a great guitar contortionist
alluded to the Axis
He provided peculiar clues
to a mystery that still hadn't been solved
Were we too caught up in a druggy haze
to see that Jesus Saves
Purple melodies dripped into tie-dyed brains
only to be erased by L.S.D. trips
Believing to be believed
Maybe the drugs made you feel
**** My Heaven
Young and tender – like a green coconut with sweet juices
Soft skin – as soft as an infant
Red blushes face – as red as the ‘Red Sun’
Sweet voice – like a hungry Dolphin echo
Firm and hard breasts – as ripe as water melons
Body contour – like an acoustic guitar
Crispy butt – as crispy as honeyed meat loaf
Mouth watering in between – as delicious as tropical seafood
Flawless silken hair – like a Stallion tail
Teasing nose – like the Swiss Alps skiing steep
A Car Is Just A Car!
A car is a car
If it can ride you nearby or far
A car is a car
When it gets you in time to the bar
A car is a car
When you are addressed as Madam or Sir
But for some
Breaking Up
I fell out of love: that’s our story’s dull ending,
as flat as life is, as dull as the grave.
Excuse me-I’ll break off the string of this love song
and smash the guitar. We have nothing to save.
The puppy is puzzled. Our furry small monster
can’t decide why we complicate simple things so-
he whines at your door and I let him enter,
when he scratches at my door, you always go.
Pierrot
I work all day,
Said Simple John,
Myself a house to buy.
I work all day,
Said Simple John,
But Pierrot wondered why.
For Pierrrot loved the long white road,
And Pierrot loved the moon,
And Pierrot loved a star-filled sky,
And the breath of a rose in June.
The Guitar Of Light
It seems someone has cast a dark net
And the town has become a trout caught in that net;
It seems no morning has ever approached here, -
The town has sub-merged in an over-flowing darkness.
The town seems to be an island of fairy tale.
It seems someones, like giants, are snatching away
The ornament from a teen girl's forehead
And then devouring her bone-marrow with rapture.
A Poet's Wooing
I woo'd a woman once,
But she was sharper than an eastern wind.
Tennyson
"What may I do to make you glad,
To make you glad and free,
Till your light smiles glance
And your bright eyes dance
Like sunbeams on the sea?
Read some rhyme that is blithe and gay
Bluesman
He's just
Any old man
In any old bar
With a guitar
Then a drunk
Comes up and say's
Play us a barre
Every line on his face
.black Is Beautiful
Every morning in the deep woods of the concrete jungle
With my near and dear ones I sing a coarse musical,
Humans raise from their good night sleep with a frown of unpalatable
They call me ‘Crow’ and express their acerbity with a scowl,
I fly in search of food and material for shelter near and far,
When Lonely On my way in search of food, humans I remember
For their frown I see whenever I tried to sing melodious tunes resembling of guitar,
For the dislike they bestow for Black color which symbolizes darkness, which they fear
All About You
In the Grandville greyhound station in the lightly drizzlin' rain
Sittin' on my suitcase goin' quietly insane all about you babe all about you
All about you and then no feelin' double dealin' things that you do
Uh every man in Grandville says he knows you well
Burn your ears if you could hear the stories that they tell
All about you babe all about you
All about you and then no feelin' double dealin' things that you do
[ guitar ] They say you're picked up every Thursday in a rich man's limousine