Poems by Bob Boyd

My life seemed the envy of many.
Became a Hollywood starlet,
Did things I regret to get there,
Sordid times, casting couches.
Costars pawing me on the set,
Some with stinking bad breath.
Had seven failed marriages,
Hard to stay married as a star,
Rarely home, always working.
Male leads, bad husbands.
Me, not really a good wife,
Like my sister back in Ohio
In a little city I came from,
Three kids, one marriage.
She had the happy life;
I only had my dreams.

Bob Boyd

Lured me to North Carolina from Vermont
Stunningly beautiful, sweet Southern accent
Playful, full of joy, a lot of serendipitous fun
A year later, no money in my ATM
And a married man she was writing too
Telling him the same stories she told me
Stunningly beautiful turned criminally ugly
Found a pretty social worker girlfriend

Bob Boyd

Flying above the pigeon coop in ever widening circles
Wings chopping rapidly through the summer air
Embracing the freedom, the magnificence of the group flight
Such a beautiful sight for me to behold, few move me so
Makes me wonder what it would have been like
To have seen passenger pigeons block out the sun

Bob Boyd

I stroll through the verdant park
Families, singles, and dogs
Relaxing, enjoying the fun day
Birds flitting in trees above
Chirping away so merrily
Insects busying themselves
In the ground beneath the park
Butterflies floating above flowers
Bees seeking nectar in them
The sun beaming over it all

Bob Boyd

They met at a high school dance when they were both sixteen,
And the song Sixteen Candles was playing during their first dance.
To their surprise, they had the same birthday, April 15.
They got married after high school, he became a mechanic.
She went to beautician school and opened a beauty shop.
They had three children, one died in an awful auto accident.
The other two went to college and had comfortable lives.
She got breast cancer at thirty-three and survived it.
He got a heart attack at sixty-six and survived that.
Now they’re celebrating their birthdays in a nursing home,
Eighty-six candles and still madly in love after all those years.

Bob Boyd

He pursued her unmercifully state to state
After she ran away from his physical abuse.
He kept her in a state of nonstop panic,
The monster that he had become or always was.
She bought a gun, kept it under her pillow.
She never needed the gun for self defense.
Fortunately he died in a road rage argument.
He drew the gun he planned to kill her with
On an quick draw off duty police officer,
Who shot him to death on highway 99.
No tears fell for this abusive monster,
Except tears of grateful relief
When she learned he was dead.

Bob Boyd

Tired of going to doctors
Done with taking all those pills
Sick of all the medical bills
That arrived almost everyday
He made the hard decision
To let nature have its way
Stopped all the medical
Savored the freedom
From doctors and pills
And the never ending bills
Died peacefully a week later

Bob Boyd

Kayleen always loved my red shirt,
The one she bought me for my birthday.
I didn’t like the shirt but never told her so.
I wore it just for her expressed delight.
You do things like this for the one you love.
Since she passed away two years ago
From a fast moving colon cancer,
I wear that red shirt more often now
It reminds me of the love she had for me.

Bob Boyd

She said the sands of our time had ran out
She loved to speak endlessly in cliches
I said fine by me our love is like a dried up desert
She said you don’t know what you’ve got until you lose it
I said good by me lose our worn out relationship
She said all’s well that ends well
I said then end it and go
She said departure is such sweet sorrow
I said methinks it’s bittersweet
She said lets kiss and make up
I said love can find a way

Bob Boyd

Met a woman named Angel
Angel or Devil I wondered
Or maybe a bit of both
Publically a perfect Angel
Privately a conniving Devil
Loved her public persona
But her private one
Scared the hell of of me

Bob Boyd