collab

Sunday, July 23, 2017

FLIGHT OF THE STREET PREACHER





























Flight of the Street Preacher



Crazy.....insane...is that your name?
That's what I heard today
They all threw rocks and chains and blocks
And I dodged out of their way

Stupid...moron...they screamed at me
As I did my 180 twirl
Why don't you go back where you came from?
We don't want you in this world!

I shrugged my shoulders and smiled at them
And blessed them in my heart
Just take your Jesus and get out of here
They yelled at me: Depart!

We want our fun, you mindless one
Our TV shows and trash
How dare you come here and bring us down
Why, we ought to whip your a--!

Bring it on, my brothers
I said, opening my book
Turned my cheek and started again
In the glow of their angry looks

For God so loved the world, I read
And they pelted me with hate
That He gave His only begotten Son
As they screamed at me my fate

The crowd grew near yet I felt no fear
Even when they tore my clothes
For I saw a hand reach from the clouds
And into the sky I rose

Holding the book and reading still
I heard their astonished wails
They stared at me and to a man
They shouted "What the hell?!"

You're closer to it than I am
I pointed to the sod
You're on your way to Hades's gates
And I'm on my way to God

But wait! they pleaded, Don't leave us now!
Teach us how to fly!
And I looked down at their startled faces
And said, First, you'll have to die

Die to self and die to sin
And die to Satan's grip
And to a man, the words "I'm lost!"
Poured forth from anguished lips

I preached to them for many hours
And they prayed the sinner's prayer
Then the day grew late and they went their way
And left me alone up there

And in the darkness, I descended down
Till the dew covered ground I met
Uh, Lord? I queried, What's going on?
And He said, "You're not dead yet."

















©by Voo
May 7, 2006
11:00 p.m.

Saturday, July 22, 2017

DOWN SOUTH TO HOME















Down South To Home



Way down south
They have this thing
Called love
It grows on trees and bushes
And in big truck patch gardens
Like watermelons
And rhubarb.

People tell me
At one time,
It even came attached to babies
Right outta the womb
But I can’t find nobody now
To corroborate that
So I just keep it filed away in my head.

Too many damned fools
And dreamers
Running loose in the world now,
You can’t believe nothing you hear
And very little of what you see
So you got to be careful
Or you’ll get run over by a lie.

My mama was sixteen
Her mama, twenty-nine
When I was born
(We all just kinda grew up together)
Them and me
Not a man in the family
And not a one of us with no daddy.

One day Mama run off
With a peddler fella
Who sold shoes and liniment
Out of the back of his car
A shiny eyed, nice looking man from up North
Who talked a good tale and charmed all us ladies
Just like a snake with a bird.

That left her mama
And me, with no mama
Alone in the world with nothing to do
But cry in our pillows and keep us a look-out
For red dust to come flying behind a big car
Hopefully, finally, bringing her back.

I waited many a year
For that day to come
And it never did while I was a kid,
The only thing that did happen
Was another bad thing
And I don’t really know how to talk about that,
So I won’t.

When I was going on fifteen
I thought about leaving, myself
So I packed up the only things
Mama ever gave me
Which was a porcelain-faced doll
And a bunch of old clothes
And me and that doll and my dreams  hit the road.

About twenty miles outside
The hills and the hollers
Where I grew to be fourteen and a little past that,
A man in a pick-up asked if I wanted a ride
And I said “Yessir.”
(I was awfully tired)
And I climbed in to his grin and his un-welcomed stare.

Two miles down the road
He pulled into some trees,
Turned off the motor,
Handed me a Grapette,
And a big pack of peanuts out of a bag
And sat there and watched me
Until I began to feel sick.

“What’s a purty little thing
Like you doing out here by yourself?”
He asked, throwing my empty out of the truck
I clutched my knapsack close to my chest,
And said I reckoned I was on vacation
And that I reckoned he ought to be starting the truck
And that I reckoned he needed to move his old hand!



“I got a knife.” I told him
And he just grinned wider and leaned in real close
“Well, I betcha you do, honey
But you know what?
I bet I can take that knife from you
And cut your pretty throat with it!”
And at that, I jumped out of that truck and I ran.

He chased me for nearly a mile, I think
Till I got so tired I couldn’t run
He’d pull up beside me and then pull off
Then he’d come up behind me and then stop in front
And I was so scared, I was about to cry
When I saw a State Trooper car come round the bend
And the man in the truck high-tailed it fast as a cat.

I ran off in the bushes till the Trooper drove by
Then I ran out of the bushes and up to the road
But I was too careless and I dropped my stuff
And my little doll fell, her head shattering like glass,
My only companion for many long years, 
Her little white face,
Broken there on the ground.

“Shit!!!!!!!!!!!” I wailed
And began to cry
“Now, I ain’t got nobody and nothing to love!”
And I just grabbed the rest of my stuff
And walked away feeling like I was dead inside,
With big dirty tears streaming all down my face
Not knowing where in God’s name, I was going to go.

Why did I just tell you all of that?
I said all of that just to say this,
I walked all the way clear up North after that
Walked into Detroit and then on to Canada
All over Antarctica, no, it wasn’t Antarctica,
One of them other cold places
That starts with an A.

And when I got past grown
And was too tired to walk,
I started dreaming about going back home
Seeing my mama and going back home
Not that she’d be there,
But I  sure wanted to see her,
And get out of the North and head on down South.

The only thing was,
No one could tell me how to get there
Everybody I asked said their compass was broke
And that nobody, nobody, went down South anymore
And that they didn’t rightly think that it existed no more
(Plus, they all want to know why I want to go
To a place that is hotter-n-hell.)

“Cause that’s where love lives!” I always tell ‘em
But I can’t explain what I mean
And they don’t know what love is anyway,
They were born in the cold, so I shut my mouth
And keep right on dreaming that I’m driving down
That long reddish road full of hot reddish dust
Back to the only home that I’ve ever known.

Back to the tar paper shack in the hills,
Where the ghosts of my mama
And her mama are waiting
And that poor little baby
That my Mama brought home
And that poor little baby that I birthed all alone
All of them, ghosts, waiting for me to come home.


Down South
Down South
Down South to home.










©Voo
June 27, 2011
10: 58 p.m.

BRING ME A DRINK FROM THE WISHING WELL







                                             
And The Birds Were Singing
By Alain Morisod and Sweet People








Bring Me A Drink From The Wishing Well





 bring me a drink from the wishing well
catch me a star from the sky
feed me a feast from the hands of true love
and light up my life with your eyes.


dance me till dawn on a moonbeam
sing me a song from the soul
set sail with me on the river of dreams
and pledge me a heart of pure gold.


write me a story that goes on forever
kiss me a kiss without end
hold me in arms that protect me from harm
and send all the love you can send.


and then, in return, my own shining star
I'll make all of your dreams come true
I'll love you forever and leave you, I'll never
and together, sing that song with you.















©by Voo

May 15, 07



ONION SKIN







ONION SKIN



MY KINGDOM IS LIKE AN ONION
BELOW WHAT'S REVEALED ON THE SURFACE:
THERE ARE MANY PARTS, MANY LAYERS
LEVELS, GOING UP, GOING DOWN
MANY HIDDEN TREASURES
WAITING TO BE PEELED BACK AND CLAIMED.

YOU ARE LIKE AN ONION
MANY COMPARTMENTS, MANY SIDES, MANY THINGS
THAT MAKE YOU WHO YOU ARE
AND SLOWLY BY SLOWLY, I PEEL BACK YOUR LAYERS
REPLACING THE WRONG WITH RIGHT, THE POOR WITH RICH
YOURSELF WITH MYSELF
UNTIL WE ARE ONE.

THIS IS HOW I MADE THE WORLD
THIS IS HOW IT IS
SHALLOW PEOPLE RECEIVE THE SHALLOW
AND THE DEEP SEEK OUT THE DEEP.
IT'S ALL LAID OUT LIKE AN ONION
BITE INTO LIFE AND IT MAKES YOU CRY
BITE INTO IT AGAIN AND YOU ACQUIRE A TASTE
WHAT MAKES YOU WEEP GIVES YOU JOY
WHAT SEEMS TO HURT THEN GIVES YOU THE ULTIMATE PLEASURE.

MY KINGDOM IS LIKE AN ONION
AND ONLY THOSE WITH EYES TO SEE CAN SEE
ONLY THOSE WITH EARS TO HEAR CAN HEAR
ONLY YOU, OF MANY LEVELS AND LAYERS
MAY SEARCH OUT THAT KINGDOM WITH DETERMINED HANDS
AND WITH PASSION AND ENDURANCE AND SURETY IN ME
MAY POSSESS IT.








©by Voo
Feb 02, 2002
 12:15 a.m. 

a prophetic word
from the Spirit


Tuesday, July 18, 2017

IN THE CLAWS OF A COLD CRUEL NIGHT







The Way by Zack Hemsey






In The Claws
 of a Cold Cruel Night


(for the victims of the slave trade that is still going on
all over the world on so many levels even here in my own country)




Clasped in the claws of a cold cruel night
I battled to breathe and I struggled to fight
With the terror that hooked me and took me away
Far from the fire and the safety of day.

In the arms of the awful and hopelessly lost
To pay just a fraction of what my life cost 
And though I was broken, the merchandise, marred
There were some who were looking for the thing that was scarred.

And they circled around me, more vultures than men
Reaching and touching and reaching again
And I bit at their fingers and I hit at their eyes
And they laughed at my despair and crowed at my cries.

In the depths of the desert, in the forests, forlorn
Slave markets for creatures in feminine form
In cages of steel and ropes without pity
Taken from home and village and city.

For the want of a woman, for the need of a night
We were captured and hidden from rescuers' sight
By men who were soul-less and wanton with lust
They shattered our innocence, they destroyed our trust.

And we prayed to our fathers and we called to the sky
As we listened in silence to the scream and the sigh
Of our sisters before us in the tents of the knave  
Who gave in and gave up when no one came to save. 

I had long dreamed since childhood of a love of my own
A husband and children and a sweet little home
Living free in my country, loving free in the arms
Of a man who would love me and keep me from harm.

For my mother had promised he would come one fine day
Sweep me off my feet and would carry me away
To the dream and the passion and the joy of my heart
But the dream's dying in me before it could start.

I'm a child! I'm a child! I'm still young and not old
I am more than this flesh, I am spirit and soul
You can't buy me with money or own me as chattel
I am human and worth more than fields full of cattle.

My eyes filled with tears, I can hardly see now
They tell me to follow, they make me to bow
They pull on my hair, they bruise and they squeeze
Like traders at market with fruit ripened to please.

But the fire in my heart and the fight in my fist
Gives me courage to say No, I won't go like this!
You can kill me and burn me and throw me away
But none of you devils will own me this day!

And they laugh in their shock at the brave little girl
Who would dare to resist her sad fate in the world
Who would stand up to men who were greater than she
But worth more to God than they'd ever be.

Then the dark crawls to shadow and dawn suddenly breaks
And the traders and buyers and those holding the stakes
Are revealed in the sunlight and exposed in the light
Like insects, they go scrambling for the cover of night.

And a man in white clothing, reaches his hand to me
Pulls me to my feet and says,  Daughter, you're free
And an army of good men, like heroes so tall
Open cages and knots and gives freedom to all.

And my sisters and I, we rejoice and we yell
As they round up the men who had made us this hell
Who had kidnapped and caught us and bought us for slaves
Who would wish that they hadn't as they lay in their graves.

We are yellow and black, we are white and we're tan
We are equal in God's sight and equal to man
We are precious and worthy and worth more than gold
But are torn as we leave there with such holes in our souls.

In the trucks going home through the forests so dark
We embrace, giving thanks with our little girl hearts
And we wonder aloud about the good man in white
Who had reached out and freed us and faded from sight.

And we pray for the children and the victims like we
All over the world who just want to be free
From the tyranny of evil and the lust of it's eyes
For we know now there's someone who does hear our cries.

You're so brave! they all tell me, You stood up to the beasts!
But I smile saying nothing till their praises have ceased
For my bones had near melted as I'd stood and defied 
And in the arms of my sisters, I fell and I cried.






©By Voo
July 19, 2017
2:42 a.m.







I don't know where this came from......the story just fell into my fingers tonight and I had to 
write it down..









                   Liza, originally by Bill Withers....
                              a powerful cover that seems so appropos




At last!!!!!!  The Sound of Freedom!!!!!

4