Category: Poems

Some people say when we dream we astral travel.
Maybe that’s true, but I don’t think we do, and

I’ve never had any sense of living my body in
some kind of ethereal, OBE dream. For example,

one day I was watching a woman doing ASMR
in a YouTube video, and her ASMR was soothing.

That night I saw and felt her in a dream performing
ASMR on me, which I see as a dream memory of

what I observed/experienced during the day.
Of course, I’ve also had dreams that had nothing

to do with what I saw or experienced during the day.
And I have had many dreams about woman I’ve

never met or known. Now maybe I met them during
astral travels, but, if so, I wish I could see them again.

Bob Boyd

His days speed by like cars racing on the Indy 500.
His body, with 90 years of use, is breaking down
like an ancient, outdated Ford Model T car.
He’s lost most of his hair and some of his breath.
If he falls on the floor, he cannot get up, and he
prays he never falls in the bathroom with his
head hitting the hard floor, but sometimes he
almost wishes he would as much as his life
is near nonexistence and he’s in constant pain.
Tired, as usual, he eases into an arm chair
and prays to God to take him away from his
barely tolerable, pain-ridden, miserable life.

Bob Boyd

The old man shuffles down the corridor on a walker
and wonders where his wife is who died a year ago.

He’s in a nursing home but doesn’t always know
where he is.

He’s medicated twice daily, and when he’s cognizant,
plays bingo in a well carpeted room with other

residents, whose names he sometimes remembers.
And when he’s self aware while playing bingo,

he thinks to himself —

how the hell did I come to this?

Bob Boyd

many of them dreaming dreams
envisioning their bright futures

some of them dead before they’re
old enough to dream

some can never dream any dreams
born too incapacitated

some are murdered in the midst
of their dreams

the fortunate realize their dreams
the unfortunate never do

maybe we dream beautiful dreams
in the afterlife

dreams that come true

Bob Boyd

In his twenties, Jonathan’s avowed goal in life was to become a great poet, and he was well on his way to achieving that goal:

he had many poems published, won a few contests, and was completely committed to his craft.

Because there wasn’t any money in poetry unless you became renowned and sold many poetry books,

he had to work at odd jobs to get by financially.

One day, after being lonely without a woman in his life, he decided to try a dating app.

But he learned most of the women on the app were mercenary and couldn’t lower their financial requirements by going out with a

low-income poet, despite the fact that Jonathan was a caring, honest, and loving guy who would have been an ideal boyfriend

or husband for any of them. Disgusted with the greedy women on the dating app, he gave up on women and decided to stay solo

until, at a poetry reading, he met Melinda, who loved his poetry and was more about true love than money.

After a year of dating, Melinda and Jonathan got married, and friends who knew them said they both were lucky to have found

ideal marriage partners who were about true love instead of riches and material things.

Bob Boyd

Alena was sixteen and a good high school girl who believed in saving her virginity for marriage to the right guy.

She went out once with a guy named Mark who tried to take
advantage of her, and when she resisted him and refused

to see him again, he told everyone he left her because
she was too easy, let him have sex with her on the first date.

Because Mark was outgoing and popular in high school, many
believed his lie and disrespected Alena and made her cry.

Though Alena was a good girl, she had a bad-ass big brother,
named Antonio who was trying to become a Mafioso.

When he heard about Mark’s lie about having sex with Alena, he swore he’d avenge his sister’s honor.

A week later, Mark disappeared and was never found by the police, volunteers or search dogs.

Antonio was never connected to Mark’s disappearance, but
right after Mark vanished, he became a Mafia made man.

Bob Boyd

I see them in cities rushing to and fro,
consumed with their lives, their joys,
their sorrows, their problems, their solutions.
But in the end when death takes us all,
none of it will matter. Freed from the
rushing to and fro.

Bob Boyd

Rory was always the daredevil in high school.
Once, seemingly supernaturally, he climbed
a near vertical brick wall, how I don’t know.
Another time he stood balanced for 10 minutes
on the roof of a car doing 55 miles per hour.
Miraculously, he pulled it off, and he always
survived his deadly risks and never stopped
taking them. But one day his luck ran out when
strolling through a city park on a peaceful
summer’s day, a limb of a tree fell on his head
and ended Rory’s life. Everyone who knew
Rory always said what an irony the guy who
survived all those deadly risks died that way.

Bob Boyd

A genius in his family of factory workers,
he aced his classes in high school, made
the honor roll in every grade, became the
class valedictorian, got a 4 year scholarship
to MIT, but after a year, he saw he didn’t fit
in with his classmates from wealthy families
who drove expensive sports cars and had
more spending money than working people.
He found the class disparity suffocating and
socially oppressive, so he dropped out of
MIT and used his genius to invent gadgets
and became a successful and wealthy man.

Bob Boyd

He bought a box of Cracker Jack caramel coated popcorn
and peanuts that he had bought for over thirty years.

Most of all he liked the prizes at the bottoms of the boxes,
and in the last box he ever bought a tiny unicorn was in it

that blew up into a real unicorn and took him for a ride
into a glorious unicorn wonderland that felt like heaven,

and he was never seen in this world again.

Bob Boyd