POEM OFF THE TOP a spur of the moment write

Imagine Richard Pryor saying this as the old man..........

Poem Off The Top

Don't go there.
It's dangerous.

"LECTRIC wires and such
danglin'
janglin' like coins on a dead man's eyes.

you say you want a revolution?
then don't talk about it....................
Go out and dingdang do it!!!

Revolve.
Dance like the devil is watchin'
And tryin' to steal your steps.

Shake your fist in his face and say, Shoo!

LISTEN. I used to be a ballet dancer in a freakish side show
    They made us  pirouette 24/7
till our toes turned into granite and then fell off
(It was beautiful but it was no fun).

Papa was a rollin' stone
But Mama was made outta moss
Hence: No Body in our house was happy.

Use to, things were like they were s'post to be, y' know?
Nowadays, nothin' works til technicians come out and charge you fifty-five dollars an hour and then it breaks down again just as soon as

they get in their Geek Squad cars and drive away. GEEK cars, ain't that what they call 'em? Geek cars!!
More like freak cars!!

Life is a cabaret, my friend.
Only, Judy Garland is dead and gone
and nobody can sing torch songs no more
Songs are illustrated by pyROtechNeeks and laser lights
And you really can't tell if they on key or not
Lawd knows I'd like to take a dang torch to most of 'em!

I'm just settin' here in this here swing
On my porch, observin', mindin' my own dang business
And you little punk, hop hip, hippity hop, Milk Dud snorting wise asses
Just come jivin' along makin' fun of life and all that is wholly, holey holy carryin'them BOOM bADA BING boom boxes
turned up so damn high you shake the tennie shoes off tha 'Lectric wires!! 

(You know why my grandson throws them shoes up there on them wires like that? He do it cause he don't want nobody to steal his shoes!!! The idjit!)
And let me tell you, it gets me red in the face and disgustipated!

GET THE HELL OUTTA  MY YARD!
i'll CALL thE CoPs!
no, on second thought.....................
they might be more trouble than you guys.

listen. listen to me.....
If you shut up and turn that &%$#@*$ damn music down, 
I'll give you a whole bag of Milk Duds
And you all can take off down to the park
With the rusted out Monkey Bars and the one seated See Saws
And get your Dud on, Dudes.

What's that?

Hmm. Alrighty then. Be that way.
Just sit down yonder on them steps
AND I'll tell you a story
'bout the old days
when dinosaurs roamed the earth
and there were no In and Outs on every corner,
Just meat markets walking around
on all fours and women hanging round the cliffs
like BIG JUICY berries. Uh hmmm.

I don't care if you believe me or not.
It's true. Read your comic books. That be where
The truth lies......Super Man and stuff like that!

LISTEN.
I gots to go to the store and then I gots to go see my Mama
and then I gots to go down to the jail and see if they found my Daddy
and then, I......I.....
aw, hell.  I'm thinkin' bout something else done happened twenty year ago! hee hee.....ain't I a mess?

Ya'll get on away from here, now, you hear?
I done talked myself out. You shouldn't come by here every day
And make me run myself ragged like this chasin' ya'll off 
I'm old as dirt 
And they ain't no flowers planted in me no more.

Shoo!!!
   and stay away from them 'LECTRIC wIRes!!!!!
lawdamercy, what this world done come to?!
Judy Garland, Judy Garland.............................
Where ARE you now that we need ya, darlin'?

©by Voo

March 31, 2012

3:07 p.m.

"That's right, that's right!!!! 

 What he said! He know what he talkin' 'bout, ya big dummies!"

Theme from Sandford and son

The Man That Got Away

by Judy Garland

Billie Holiday
I'll Be Seeing You

I PLAY FOR YOU A VIOLIN

I Play For You a Violin

I play for you a violin

And song so soft and sweet

I keep my eyes downcast, demure

As I sit at your feet.

I play for hours at your request

Till time has lost it's meaning

And candles burn down to their wicks

And night is slowly weaning.

Before the dawn has fully come

You hold your hand up high

And bid me stop my melody

Arise and say goodbye.

You do not look back at my face

Tearstung and raised to light

You do not see the love I bear

As you pass from my sight.

A servant girl, that's all I am

With gifted hands to play

Sweet melodies to comfort you

From torments of your day.

A king of royal dynasty

A man of power and yet

You find no peace in power's grasp

No love in life's plan set.

And so I play and so you listen

In silence, just we two

Night after night till daylight breaks

And my heart breaks for you.

You have no inkling of the love

I feel there as I play

Pretending you are mine alone

Till morn takes you away.

To kingly duties, kingly demands

The power of life and death

There in your words, there in your hands

There in your very breath.

All day I wait till midnight comes

For the summon and the call

Your weary face so full of woe

Till at your feet I fall.

And I play for you my violin

Pray peace into the gloom

Wait for your sigh with tear filled eyes

As my love fills up the room.

©by Voo

April 28, 2007

3:45 p.m.

NOTHING RHYMED TODAY

Nothing Rhymed Today

Nothing rhymed today

There was no meter or melody

No singing lyric or verse of song

Just jangled nerves and unspoken fears

Left dangling on my key chain.

Cars passed me

In the pouring rain

And never acknowledged the girl

With the gas can and the thumb

And the mascara running down my face.

I could have shown some leg

I suppose

But my clothes were plastered to me

Like I had been poured into them

And everything I had was exposed already.

If it had been yesterday

I would have laughed at my mishap

Run down the highway

Danced in the rain and stopped traffic

With the glow on my shining face.

Everything rhymed yesterday

Every word that issued from my mouth

Was finely tuned, in perfect key

Poetry sprang from my fingertips

And car horns sounded like sonnets.

But I have no music left in me

It walked out in your suitcase last night

Winked it's dark eye and said goodbye

And I heard it laughing

All the way down the staircase to the street.

Poetry is a traitor

It makes you write when you don't want to

From places you don't want to revisit

Sing songs so sad they break the heart

And make rhymes of things that will never rhyme again.

©by Voo

August 8, 07

CLANDESTINE RAIN (the splendor of your laughing face)

Clandestine Rain

(the splendor of your laughing face)

Waiting in the carriage at the end of Summer Lane

I pulled the fur close to my neck for the fall of sudden rain

Had brought a chill into the air and the horses stamped their feet

They longed for home, they didn't care who I had come to meet.

The driver cleared his throat and pulled his cap low on his head

A lightning bolt flashed bright nearby and filled my heart with dread

I couldn't understand why you were tarrying so long

I needed wine and candlelight and my ears full of your song.

I needed you close in my arms and dazzling with your smile

The night wore on and thunder roared and accompanied me a while

I thought about your sweet, sweet face, I thought about your hands

That played the violin for me as my eyes devoured the man.

I thought about how you loved me in a way I've never known

A royal, true, and unlike you, with no home of your own

To palace bred and palace born, to loveless life unshared

Marriage arranged so cold, estranged, to a man that never cared.

And you, a gypsy, wild and free with raven eyes and locks

Living life on your own terms free of my rules and clocks

What splendor in your laughing face! What wonder in your eyes!

You brought a truth to life in me that had known, till then, but lies.

Clandestine meetings in the dark, chance meetings on the street

Your eyes would find me and my heart would fall down at your feet

The palace spies, they shadowed me, they looked to find my fault

So often did they spoil our joy and bring our plans to naught.

But sometimes, sometimes, did I slip past and meet you in the night

And share with you such happy times there in the candlelight

But here tonight, I wait for you in the carriage in the rain

And longing for you with a love that feels less like love than pain.

The driver stills the horses now who are chomping at their bits

Wild eyed, they scream in horses' tongues as the jagged lightning hits

My face is buried in my hands, I know that I should go

But if I leave, my soul will grieve and you'll come and will not know.

A letter! I think, I'll leave a note for you there by the tree

Where you oft leave your gifts and poems and carved a heart for me

I hurry to do the task and write, my hands trembling in the strife

But the smile on my lips dies as the carriage door opens

And a cold voice says "Hello, wife!"

© by Voo

Feb 10, 2005 

12:30 a.m.

Nocturne by Secret Garden

play the two videos at same time
for perfect soundtrack.......

I WENT DOWN DEAD AND CAME UP HALF ALIVE

                                    

 

 .....Vapor by Aleah...great song

                       adds so much to this experience....

I Went Down Dead
And Came Back half Alive

backstory.............

(Meeting you 

Was like the end of the blues

At the end of the lonely

At the end of the rainbow

On a Friday night in Memphis

Before the King died.)

There you were

In black leather and hair

Looking, pretending

Like you had not a care.....

And there I was standing

In my leather and lace

My heart like a time bomb

And my life on my face......

Devil in your heart

Devil in your mind

Devil in your intentions

So mistaken for kind.

I was a kid in a candy store

With no money to spend

And you were dark chocolate

Double-coated in sin.

In the shade of the Peabody

The ducks paraded on by

As your lips touched my fingers

Soft as clouds in the sky.

I was enamored by romance

I was dazzled by dust

You convinced me you loved me

We both know it was lust.

There was something inside me

That bid something in you

That then slithered up to me

Hiding lies from the true.

A white horse and white carriage
Rode us through all the rain
My arms pricked with red roses
That ignored all the pain.

To the junk yards of Memphis

With their rusted out cars

We ran singing the blues songs

That came streaming from bars.

In the back of a Thunderbird

With the storm on the roof

You said you wanted me so much

And then gave me the proof.

In the dawn we walked back

In the mist and the fog

To the calls of the whippoorwills

And the growls of a dog.

Our arms ‘twined up together

Our heads heavy with sleep

Our bodies emptied of yearning

And my heart digging deep.

“Till tomorrow.” you whispered

Kissed my cheek and was gone

And I stood in the shadows

So amazed and alone.

Falling later on my bed

The sun burgled inside

Like a thief stealing memories

There I laughed, then I cried.

          And I laughed through the noon time

And I laughed all the day

And I laughed till the darkness

Took the sunshine away.

Then I ran down to Downtown

And I looked for you there

To  the lobby of the Hotel,

To Beale Street and the Square.

I was breathless and anxious

Full of tension and fear

That you’d just been a vision

That my heart had brought here.

So I sat on an iron bench

All bereft and perturbed

Till a black motorcycle

Purred it’s way to the curb.

And your black glove, it beckoned

And I ran to your side

Threw my arms around your waist

As we roared off to ride.

Through the streets and the starlight

To the river of mud

Past the city and country

With such fire in our blood.

Our hair blown back like ribbons

In the sweet Memphis breeze

And we melded together

Like the bark and the trees.

To the grass on a hill top

‘Neath the moonlight so bright

There we clung like two dreamers

Holding on to the night.

And for days I just sleepwalked

As I waited for dark

And your beautiful brown eyes

Full of danger and spark.

So alive in your presence

Like I’d not been before

Just a dead woman walking

Through a mausoleum door.

Looking for something living

That I never had found

On the earth, in the heavens

In the sea, on the ground.

Till that night brought you to me

Out of vapor and hope

And then bound me forever

With a cruel velvet rope.

And your soft voice calls to me

Though I don’t see your face

I have searched every where

And have found not a trace.

But I feel you beside me

And behind and within

Like the caress of a raindrop

And a cold winter wind.

Love, you found me in Memphis

On that wet city street

As you rescued the roses

That had dropped at my feet.

And you smiled as you sang me

 “Are You Lonesome Tonight?”

Brought me joy and such misery

When you dropped from my sight.

I  don’t know what I’ve done

I don’t know what I said

I was dead when you met me

Now I’m only half dead.

Haunting me, you remain

In my heart and my mind

Where I still see your face

Though my eyes have gone blind.

To the pain and the pleasure

To the sun and the rain

Every night I go searching

Till I find you again.

end story……………….

(Losing you

Was like gasping for breath

At the end of a nightmare

At the end of the night

And lonely long nights in Memphis

After the King died.) 

By Voo

© April 8, 2012

9:28 p.m.

                                              .............R.I.P. Cousin E............see you on 
                                                 the other side..........