The Lure of the Superficial

Her beauty captivated him.
Never saw a woman as beautiful as her.

Her face and body perfect,
eyes heavenly blue.

But he failed to take the time to
know her beyond the superficial.

Fell in love with her immediately,
married her too soon.

Now he’s in a marriage from hell
with a woman impossible to live with

who is planning to ruin his reputation
and his life

when she tells all in court with some
lies thrown in and ruins him financially too.

Bob Boyd

Seed of Infamy

It was as if evil had been implanted in him from birth,
and he never had a chance to be good.

Even his face had an evil look that only grew worse
as he became older.

When he was a child of six, he began kidnapped
dogs and cats in his neighborhood, torturing and killing them.

At age sixteen, he began his kills, and got away with them
until age 27, when the police finally were on to him.

When they appeared at his house, he resisted arrest
and had a shootout with the police

whereupon he walked into a storm bullets and committed
death by cop with his hellborn infamy destroyed forever.

Bob Boyd

A Powerful Initiation into a Meditation Technique

25 and about finding the truth.
25 and about higher
states of consciousness.
25 and a full blown seeker,
I get initiated into a
meditation method
in a room in Cambridge, Mass
not far from Radcliffe
and Harvard U.

An elaborate ceremony,
an altar and incense burning,
the initiator a woman chanting.
I get a sacred Hindu mantra.
I begin to mentally repeat it

A minute later, I hear a
soft snapping sound in the
center of my forehead,
maybe where the third eye
is said to be, maybe not.

My consciousness expands
and its flooded with
indescribable bliss
beyond anything
I’d ever imagined.

I walk out of the
meditation room high and
feeling like a Hindu monk
in a flowing robe, feeling like
I’d come home, feeling like
I’d been a Hindu monk
in a former life.

Bob Boyd

Sixteen Full of Raging Hormones and a Hot Girl My Age Sitting Next to Me in a Car and Calling Me Chicken

A friend and I driving around in his father’s car, both of us sixteen with raging hormones.
A hot, voluptuous girl our age thumbs a ride. My friend gives her a lift.

She gets in the car in the front seat next to me, her perfume exhilarating. She rubs my leg and calls me chicken.

But I was unaffected, not even tempted to react to her challenge despite her beautiful face and voluptuous body.

She was sloppy drunk, and a woman drunk has always been a turn off to me.

Plus, it just wouldn’t have been right to take advantage of her in that vulnerable condition.

Though a troubled kid, I had some principles, and in some cases a solid sense of right and wrong.

But if I’d met her at a dance sober and looking as good as she did, I would have been enamored and wanting to get to know her.

Surprisingly, when we let her off at her destination, she thanked me for not taking advantage of her.

That was one of the few times I shined like a star in my wayward, wrong side of the tracks, troubled youth.

I remember it and write about it because of the rarity of me doing anything right and memorable when I was a teenage greaser, a loser and a rebel, though never a bully or in trouble with the Law.

Bob Boyd

That White-Haired Celtic Woman Holding the Dragon in the Banner Above

As I became fascinating with dragons, I somehow got the idea of how cool it would look having a real life picture of a Celtic woman in a blue medieval dress hugging a large, subdued giant dragon.

I saw this as a reversal of the old legend of a princess imprisoned in a castle by an evil dragon that only a brave knight could save her from.

I saw it as a dragon imprisoned by her magical love and magnetic compassion.
And I liked the idea of that.

I feel there is probably more symbolism to that picture than I can imagine,
perhaps something like a liberating feminine symbol of a woman’s power.

Or maybe a deeper metaphysical meaning beyond my designing intention or comprehension.

Whether a simple or profound meaning, I love how great and realistic that picture looks.

Bob Boyd

The Greening of April

I look outside my apartment
and see the leaves on the trees
like never before

and I marvel at how green the
reborn leaves have become
this month of April.

Before I was retired, I never
noticed these wonders of
nature. I was so consumed
with my job, I paid no
attention to them.

Now I see them as though
my senses have become
alive beyond belief,

as though I have new eyes
that have opened to nature’s
seasonal splendors with
greater clarity and sight.

And I see the beautiful blue of the sky
and the greening of the lush grass
that surrounds my apartment.

Now I appreciate the greening
of April like never before.

Bob Boyd

I Look Forward to Dying Though Not in a Suicidal Sense

I’ve lived 80 years of life, have lived in many places,
many states and Europe and the Philippines.

I’ve had a reasonably full life with many adventures
and have no need for more earthly adventures.

I see death as the greatest adventure ever.

I see death as a shedding of earthly cares and
a temporary body with it’s vulnerabilities to
aging, disabilities and diseases that one is
rid of when newly born young and fresh
in the afterlife.

And I am in a position with no attachments,
so I can easily let go when death comes.

If I had a girlfriend or a wife, my heart would
break at even the thought of leaving her.
I would not want to let go unless we could
go together.

I’d fight to stay alive with every iota of my
being to stay with her and not leave her
behind while I ascended into what I see as
a greater, wonderous world.

But because I’m so accepting of dying,
and because I feel so incredibly good,
still working out, exercising daily,
as if I were nearly indestructible,
I’ll probably be here for many more years,
more than I want to be.

And as you can never say never, maybe
one day I’ll be blissfully anchored
to this world with a girlfriend or a wife
and unable to let go when death comes.

Or maybe like sometimes happens,
we’d go out together or each would
die within days of the other.

In the meantime, come Death
take me home to what I believe
is my true home.

And though I’m not a fundamentalist
Christian but a devout believer in Christ
in a non-churched mystical fashion,
maybe Jesus will meet me at the doorway
to death and take me to paradise.

Or maybe I’ll merge with the cosmos,
become post life enlightened and live
forever in the eternal bliss consciousness.

Whatever the outcome, I look forward to dying
though not in a suicidal sense.

Bob Boyd

homebodies and social butterflies

don’t always make good romantic partners
one is content staying home most of the time
the other has to get out all of the time
though some seem to make it work
I read Dolly Parton and her husband did
God bless them I don’t know how
but Dolly must be an exceptional person
to stay faithful with all the temptations
she could have had as an entertainer
I have alway been mostly a homebody
though in my wild youth I was out all the time
when I had a romantic partner I preferred
to stay home most of the time and to
go out occasionally unlike some women
I’d been with who had to get out all the time
with a wife like that I was terribly lonely
and remember an old country song
isn’t it lonely together and eventually
I had to leave her even though she
surprisingly begged me to stay despite the
homebody social butterfly incompatibility.

bob boyd

A Theory of What’s Happening to the Missing 411s

Consider all these people who go missing
without a clue of what happened to them

except maybe their shoes the only thing
found with no traces, and even search and

rescue dogs can’t pick up a scent of them.

Supposedly their numbers are in the thousands
and no one knows what happened to them.

Not a trace of the vanishings and no logical
explanations for their disappearances.

Speculations vary: portals, aliens, Bigfoot,
Dogman, or something else supernatural
and unknown.

I’ve listened to cases where allegedly people
have experienced bizarre beings that appeared
to them via other dimensions.

For example, something quasi formless that
morphs into bizarre forms and beckons them
while everything gets quiet all around them,
or a form that emits a vibration that
vibrates everything around that a person,
even that person’s keys in his pocket.

As crazy as it sounds and may be, imagine if
beings from other dimensions were instantly
manifesting in this dimension and snatching
these people into those dimensions for
whatever reasons.

A chilling thought indeed. And, in my opinion,
as good a guess as any other explanation.

As for me, I’m open to the theory these
inexplicable 411 missing cases could be
kidnappings by aliens with the ability to
move with ease in and out of dimensions.

But, of course, that could be utter nonsense,
and nobody knows for sure the fate of the 411s.

Bob Boyd

Ghost Hunters

Wouldn’t want to be a ghost hunter
if ghosts are real

Imagine if they are real and you
encountered one

and it decided to follow you home
to haunt and terrify you

and you couldn’t protect yourself
from what you could not strike or stop

Imagine if it pervaded your dreams
and every part of your life

as if it had totally possessed you
like a demon from hell

Unless you were made of sterner stuff
that haunting possession

might drive you full blown crazy

And there’s this saying when you go
looking for the paranormal
the paranormal comes looking for you

But when you see ghost hunters
on TV none of them seem to have
this happen to them

But that’s TV and you can’t always
believe what you see on TV

Whatever the case ghost hunting
would never be for me

Bob Boyd

I Can’t Believe It’s All Bad Karma

I can’t believe people who go through horrific things in this life were bad people in past lives who are getting their due.

I think if karma is factual it’s more complicated than that. I think there is randomness in the equation.

For example, a while back in the news it was reported a woman in New York was walking through a park and a large tree branch fell on her and killed her.

I see that as randomness and not some karmic payback.

Personally, I don’t like the idea of karma. I don’t like the idea of assigning a person’s bad behavior in a former life to bad karma when they are going through something horrendous like a terminal brain cancer or the loss of their legs.

I do believe in action and reaction in this life. A person commits a crime and usually imprisonment is the reaction, but in my belief that’s not past life or this life bad karma.

But karma is based on belief and speculation, and I choose to believe there’s more than karma involved when it comes to a person’s suffering.

Bob Boyd

A Dream of Bombs Falling

Last night I dreamed about bombs
beginning to fall, and braced for
the impending explosions,
but woke up before the bombs fell.

Though a dream, the feeling was
as real as if I were in a country
where bombs were always
about to fall.

I woke up relieved the falling bombs
were only a dream, and wondered
what that dream was really about

or what I’d seen or read about
during the day that might have
manifested in that dream.

Now I’m imagining how horrifying it
must be to live, or have lived, in a country
where bombs are always about to fall.

Bob Boyd

How Much You Meant to Me

Sitting at my computer in front of a window
with the moonlight coming through,
I find myself thinking about you.

And I’m remembering how nice it was
being with you.

And what a wonderful part of my life those
seven years were.

Though our love ended when you got sick
and didn’t want to burden me

and left despite my forever vow to be there
always for you, I’m okay with our lost love now.

And though alone and over twenty years older,
I’ll go to my grave remembering you
and how much you meant to me.

Bob Boyd

Yikes! Yelp Is Stalking me!

A few weeks ago, I entered a donut shop
called Duck Donuts.

Though I rarely eat donuts and unlike
Häagen-Dazs ice cream, I have no
addiction to them.

But I was intrigued by the name, perhaps
partly because I like ducks.

I tried a plain donut to sort of test the taste
in its purer form instead of a donut with
all the bits and extras.

The donut was the best plain donut I ever
tasted, and I wondered if any other
donut shops had plain donuts as good
or better.

I like to experiment, so my plan was to
try plain donuts in other donut shops in
Greensboro, NC where I live.

I did a search with Yelp and saw donut shops
like Dunkin Donuts, Krispy Kreme, and Donut World

To my surprise, days later I got an email from
Yelp, “How was Donut World?”

Now I know Yelp isn’t psychic, so clearly it was
stalking me, but it’s stalking was faulty as
a fake psychic’s guesses, and I’ve not been
to Donut World so far.

Bob Boyd

I’m Reading a Poetry Book Backwards

I’m reading a poetry book beginning at the
end of it. but, trust me, I’m not a half wit.

What! You say that sounds odd. I have to agree,
trying to be an objective critic of me.

But hear me out and you might see the method
in my oddness is far from insanity.

I began by reading the book from the start,
but felt the poems had no heart.

So to in an attempt to put my dislike in the past,
I thought maybe the best were saved for last.

Now maybe that was crazy and my thinking was
hazy.

But like a crescendo, and I write this with no
innuendo, the poems at the ending were
better, more heartrending and mind bending.

Bob Boyd

The Women Who Tamed Dragons

It was thought in the west dragons were dangerous beasts
that had to be killed because of their fire-breathing threat.

But the dragons were really gentle creatures reacting to
the attacks upon them to protect themselves

as even any human would do if defamed and attacked
mercilessly.

Four wise and tendered-hearted women didn’t believe
the fake news and the hype about dragons.

They approached them without the preconceived notions,
the news and the hype had poisoned so many others with.

They approached them with respectful gentleness and disarming kindness,
and they tamed the dragons with love instead of subduing them with the sword.

Bob Boyd

The Rape of a Woman

I’ve never understood how a man could
rape a woman.

I’ve never understood how a man could
violate a woman despite her protests,
pleadings, cries and screams.

You have to be a soulless fucking monster,
evil and heartless as a goddamned demon
to attack and harm a woman like that,

to inflict emotional scars on her that I
imagine last for her entire life.

In my opinion, a rape is in a way worse than
a murder.

When murdered, you don’t have to live
with the anguish for the rest of your life.

And were I able to change the laws, I’d
make the penalty for rape as severe as
that of murder.

Bob Boyd

Life on Planet K2-18b?

There might be life on a planet called K2-18b,
a planet that orbits a star 120 light-years away,
astronomers say.

A molecule on earth produced by living organisms like
marine algae was detected in the planets atmosphere,
astronomers have found.

Which led to the speculation that the planet might be
“covered with a warm ocean, brimming with life.”

Imagine if it were brimming with aliens unlike any
lifeforms we could ever have imagined.

A revelation I’ve been waiting for, proof of a planet
out of the estimated 50 sextillion planets that hosts
life less or more advanced than life on earth.

If that day comes in my lifetime, my hope is that life will be more like benevolent ETs than hostile Klingons.

Bob Boyd

My New Häagen-Dazs Obsession

First it was Vanilla Swiss Almond.
I went nuts about it! Delicious!

Sometimes I liked Chocolate Peanut Butter,
a smooth buttery nuttery spread of
chocolate and peanut butter. Scrumptious!

Now I’ve found a new Häagen-Dazs love,
Coffee Chip, which contains two of my
favorite things, coffee and chocolate. Heavenly!

And I’m thinking about asking God if there’s
a heaven and I get a reprieve to get in
it – to let me eat Häagen-Dazs Coffee Chip
as my eternal staple there. Selah!

Bob Boyd