"High Hopes" Frank Sinatra

Yeah...You!

"I might be a little bit in love with you."

You look around.

"Yeah, you.  Is that so hard to believe? Or is it just distasteful to you?"

You shake your head.

"Don’t worry.  I’m not asking you for anything."

You smile.

"Really!  I’m not. Nor am I expecting anything. I’m no fool!"

You gaze at me silently.

"You always were the quiet one.  And you know what they say, don’t you?"

Your smile is wider this time.

"Yes.  Silent rivers run deep.  I just wish I knew what you were thinking!"

You raise the drink to your lips and sip.

"I guess it doesn’t matter, though.  Whatever you’re thinking, it’s not about me."

You throw back your head and laugh.

A bell jangles somewhere, and I blink.  Shit!  This is getting worse and worse.  I cannot keep doing this.  Making up one-sided conversations between me and you, the man I’ve been crushing on this whole year is not the way to win friends and influence people.  Nor you, for that matter.  Especially since you don’t even know I exist.  None of those gestures or smiles were even aimed at me, for goodness sake!  These people must think I’m crazy!  It’s a wonder they haven’t called the insane asylum to come get me already.

I turn my eyes back to where you’re sitting with your friend.  He says something to you, and you laugh again and turn your head.  Our eyes meet for the first time in recorded history.  I gape like a fool, and then you break the contact.  You call for the bill.  I ease myself out of the booth I am sitting in, and hurry to pay for my own meal.  This first real contact has rattled me. Rushing by your table, my head in a whirl, my eyes focused on the cash register, I fail to see you check me out.

Maybe I need to stop coming here for lunch, I think, as I rush out to my car.  I can bring a salad or a sandwich with me.  Or go to MacDonald’s.  I don’t need to eat at a fancy eatery.  It’s not like we know each other, and now that you’ve seen me, if I show up tomorrow, it’ll look like I’m stalking you.  I ignore the voice that asks “Well, aren’t you?”  Shut up, I tell myself.  Just shut up!
 

I am almost at my car when I hear an unfamiliar male voice.

"You dropped this," it says.

I turn around, startled, to see who is speaking.  You’re standing there with a slip of paper in your hand.  I look around.

"Yeah…you," you say.

~ KDB

Copyright 2014

Blank Spaces (A Collaboration)

(A collaboration between a friend on Tumblr, Peregrine (http://youreyesblazeout.tumblr.com/) and me.)

It’s not as though there is
a right or wrong way
to fill in this blank space.
It’s not a quiz.
And yet,
it says so much
that I see “lost”,
and you see “luckiest”.

What does it mean?
I see the hole.
You see the donut.
I am yin.
You are yang.
I am the blank space.
You fill me in.
We are interconnected.

It isn’t a question
of what’s right and wrong,
but of the responses
we’ve been trained to live.
In how many ways,
have you been filled with
you’re the “least,”
the “littlest,” the “lowliest.”

But my mouth will fill you
only with the “loftiest” words.
My eyes will only see
the “loveliest” in you.
And always, in all ways,
will I fill the “loneliest” places in you,
the “lustiest” places in you,
the blank spaces in you, with my love.

~ Peregrine and KDB

Copyright 2014

(Peregrine's is in plain text, mine is in italics.)

(Picture Source: prostoslozhno)

Orwellian, or Right is Wrong

"When"?  Say rather
"If"…and my word,
What an “if” that would be!
And then, of course,
There’s that whole
"Right place" thing…
Where IS that, anyway?

Obviously, then,
When the wrong turn
Gets you to
The right place,
It was all
A HUGE mistake!
Surely you see that?

If it were truly
A wrong turn,
The end would be dead…
Like those cul-de-sacs
That take you round
In circles, back
To where you came from.

By this logic,
If you end up
In the right place
From that wrong turn,
Then for you,
Right is wrong, like life
In Orwell’s novel.

~ KDB

Copyright 2014

Shitkicker

I am not that girl
Who does as she is told.
I am not a girl.
Funny how some men
Seem to forget that,
And expect obedience,
Consent, submission
From someone like me.
I may not be in your face
But that isn’t a sign
That I’m downtrodden.
Go ahead,
Raise your boot.
You’ll see…
I’m not under it!

~ KDB

Copyright 2014

Source: http://distantpassion.tumblr.com/post/81331711338

Toccata

Everything about this greyscale piano —
from its keys like uneven teeth,
in need of more than brushing
to remove the dust and decay
that years of mistreatment
and neglect have caused —
to the space it occupies,
all bricks and mortar, rough-hewn,
cold and under-used,
bespeak a painful loss.

No music warms the cold places
in that stony room.
No sharps and flats swell round
the empty spaces,
nor wisps of airy tunes
disturb the curled leaves
of the abandoned sheets.
A paradox on legs,
the ancient instrument seems
a statement of fragility and force.

Fortissimo, pianissimo…
no sounds at all
defy the rigid quiet,
or mar the weathered stillness
of this antique…
disregarded, disrespected,
a hushed requiem for a life
lived far too long,
or else too soon discarded…
its death an unvoiced crescendo.

~ KDB

Copyright 2014

Time

Kenny Chesney is one of my favorite country artists.  He sings a song titled “Don’t Blink” about the swift and sure passage of time, and the necessity of making the best use of the years you won’t even notice slipping through your fingers.  I quote a few phrases from the lyrics for his song, along with a link to it on YouTube.)

Kenny Chesney sang it…

"Don’t blink!" he sang,
his rich, nutty voice
reminding me
that time waits
for no one.

"Just like that",
I’m here,
an over-fifty,
understanding
what my mother
must have felt
watching me.

"You take a nap"
and no one’s left
to share the blues with.

"Your babies growing"
not going,
'cause they can't,
and you in two minds
about that.

"A hundred years"
is likely
no more than
a drop of water
in the ocean
of time.

~ KDB

Copyright 2014