By Alfred Brown
This is the poem where I finally got to use the sentence that had been rattling in my brain for a few years “Everything was fine until I got shot in the face.” I wrote it first sometime, probably around 2013, then I did some edits to it around 2014 or 2015. The intention with the edits was to make the poems into songs.
61 -fading fast (continued in part 6)
The prisoner woke up alert
Put his bare feet on the dirt
Waited till he heard the bell
And stood as they opened his cell
He marched down the hall
Walking slow but keeping tall
His chains would clatter and clink
While his mind continued to think
He knew his chance was soon
At sometime before noon
They would be put in a line
And he would listen for the sign
When that moment finally came
Though he knew he’d take the blame
He did as he was forced to do
He took the shiv from his shoe
He never knew the other guy
But he said to himself it’s him or i
One of us must die today
I prefer it to go this way
He was chosen for this task
Though he certainly did not ask
Because his number came right after
This thought elicited laughter
This alerted the other man in front
Who got the point while it was blunt
So before the prisoner could shank
The other guy struck him in his flank
The prisoner dropped the shiv
Now it was the other man’s point to give
He thought as he lay that this was worst
Laughed again because today his number was first
If i came to you
With an open heart
And a mind of love
Would you know me
If i came to you
With eyes clear
And arms waiting
Would you show me
What it means to be
In the aura of you
As it shines out
And comes through
If i lay with you
As we hold each other
And kiss
And pass the time
If i lay with you
As we get to know
One another and inside
Each other’s mind
What does it matter
What we do
Or what we think
When the sun is new
If i promise
To stay all night
And well into
The morning
If i promise
To stay even if
When I leave
It may be storming
Will you want me
Will you want me too
Red yellow green
Purple gold and blue
Nonsense words
Nonsense thoughts
Fly like birds
Sleep on cots
Wheys and curds
Old robots
These absurds
Be forgots
Flowers wither and leaves fall off
And roots dry up in the ground
As you age you hack and cough
And then one day you make no sound
Animals that once could out run
Any predator that comes around
Find one day frolicking in the sun
That they can’t and are taken down
Such is life and so is death
Nothing lasts forever on earth
You can do what you can maybe your best
But eventually you lie in the dirt
But you can’t despair your lot
Put up with it for what it’s worth
Be happy with the little you got
Many have gotten by with much worse
And in the end everyone has the same
Waiting for them when it’s over
Everyone has to quit the game
That doesn’t make you a loser
It just makes you alive in this world
So be a fighter a giver and a lover
And accept all that has and will occur
And then there won’t be too much to suffer
If i stay here with you
And not leave til the morrow
Would what you let me do
Cause you later sorrow
I don’t want to say what
For you is truly best
You know better than i but
This much i can attest
Sometimes passion is strong
And makes us do some things
That we later feel were wrong
With what consequence brings
But I feel it is simple and
I put it now to your choice
Take what is here and in hand
But if it sours give no voice
Instead just accept it all
As part of what must be
For when curtains fall
You must return to reality
Can’t say for sure
What’s going on
I can’t ensure
There’ll be a dawn
I can only say
There is right now
A time and way
That i know how
To pass some time
I’ll do it soon
Relax my mind
Whistle a tune
A melody
Gets in my head
And every
Night in my bed
I sleep to sounds
That play all night
In the morning
I see the light
And as I wake
Wonderin what
More i can take
I feel my gut
Is churning so’s
I stop and breathe
And repeat those
Words I believe