Poems by 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