"Yesterday is not ours to recover, but
tomorrow is ours to win or to lose."
- Lyndon B. Johnson

I have fought the good fight,
With all I have,
With all I am.
I think back on all the victories.
Those glorious battles where,
I was the victor.
Gather up all the medals!
Let me gaze upon the glory,
Before I go down.

My spirit is worn,
And I seek the final rest.
I have nothing left,
And the enemy is at the door.
Soon I shall feel the sting on my neck,
And my final breath shall escape me.

Where I go many men have gone before,
And my victor shall gaze upon his future,
As he looks down on me.

I have done all I can do,
I have nothing more to give.

I’m waiting for you, holding on with faith,
That you will be here just as you said.
People say I am foolish for falling in love,
Wondering what is wrong with my head.

But I know because I peered into your heart,
And I know that you would be here today,
If not for your life you find yourself in.
Changes are just a leap of faith away.

The glue just dried on my reconstructed heart,
Imperfect with chips and cracks evident.
But it’s my best that I have to give you,
And I know it is not too opulent.

But I know that things will be alright,
Perfection is not what you or I do seek.
All things become beautiful in love,
Mysteriously things are not so bleak.

My eyes have opened to this amazing truth,
Judge not mistakes and sins, instead,
The past does not define who we are,
But it prepares us for the road ahead.

Nothing makes a person richer,
Than having many a true friend.
They celebrate your victories,
And stay with you ‘til the end.

Compared with friends, the things you own,
Hold no real measure of value.
They come and go, gone and replaced,
They do nothing to see you through.

But a friend so true will gather near,
Through good times and the bad.
But one who leaves in your time of need,
Is a friend you never had.

Always give the gift of kindness,
Be a friend to have one too.
And count your riches friend by friend,
These blessings are gifted to you.

BCJ, 1 Oct 2008

Happy birthday, my dear twin,
Where ever you may be.
Wasn’t this suppose to be the year,
You were going to celebrate it with me?

Two and forty years ago,
Our lives were set in motion.
We came together for a time,
But now are separated by an ocean.

Twins can feel as though the other,
Each pain and joy and tear.
But now that we’ve been separated,
I can barely breathe, I fear.

My soul shall never rest again,
Forever hungry, craving that satisfaction,
Of knowing the taste of true love’s kiss.

For many years, my soul doth slept,
In a numbed hibernation.
I gave away my heart, love filled,
Returned empty in frustration.

Acceptance of the status quo,
Believing that was all love was to be,
Survival brought restlessness to my soul,
Stirrings from slumber within me.

Opening my eyes, I saw a little lost butterfly,
Who led me to a silver brook,
Reflections showing not who I am,
But what I was about to be.

Like the butterfly who shed her cocoon,
I was ready for the new life ahead of me.
But the lost butterfly would fly on ahead,
In search of her own fulfilled dreams.

Eyes wide open, fate brought love to me,
My soul was filled with life.
Traveling a difficult road to get there,
I knew it was worth the strife.

A dream come true, it was true love’s kiss,
A life of never-ending bliss,
Until she called it quits and went home.

Remembering the sweet taste on my lips,
And the touch of true love on my soul,
I shall not be satisfied until I taste again.

BCJ - 9/22/08

On the other side of this curtain,
Are things I am not certain,
But time will provide me the clue.

Fate leaves me confused.
Does it make you amused,
That I’m wondering what I should do?

I try hard to believe,
Though some call me naïve,
That I have put my faith in you.

Shall I rein in my heart,
Because we are apart?
You have never shared in my milieu.

How long must I wait?
Why do you hesitate,
Or is it time for me to bid you adieux?

-BCJ, 20 June 2008

Rubbing the tear-streaked pane,
I peer through the window clearly,
The landscape beckoning me to leave my fortress.

I returned embattled just yesterday,
Injured by my most trusted ally,
Wounds still fresh keeping me from pondering denial.

Temptation urges me to bolt the shutters,
And remain within safe towers,
To shed concern over the next friend-turned-foe.

But Seclusion was not the purpose,
For which I have been sanctioned,
And to do so would render my victories for naught.

Three years I have been on this quest,
In search of True Love's prize,
But today I struggle to believe in its existence.

I honored my duty and began my watch,
Staring through these clouded portals,
Observing a figure approaching the gates.

In the distance it sounded like singing,
I strained to hear her tones so sweet,
Until she drew nearer and her words captivated me.

Listening to her song,
I realized she was singing to me,
Proclaiming True Love's arrival draws near.

Acceptance of her message,
Was slow on my weary heart,
But I listened until I surrendered my doubts.

Alas! Life began to fill my soul,
And my heart accompanied Love's song,
Giving healing to my wounds and courage to seek Love's source.

Wandering through the gates,
Love was waiting there for to meet,
Where I saw your beauty and took your hands in mine.

Love surrounded us and filled us with its song,
"Your hearts are the prize of the quests made together,
Life comes from love, and love is forever."



-BCJ, 30 May 2008

Stardust: Very nice....keep on posting!!

My eyes behold your wonder
My heart can feel your love
My head tells me it cannot be
My soul has found it's glove

We wander through Existance
Each lost in Time's Expanse
Crossing hurdles,streams and highways
We walk,skip,run and dance

Then somewhere in an instant
Our souls come face to face
Time seems to stop forever
Aloneness is erased

But only for a heartbeat
Then onward we must go
completing our destiny
continuing to grow

TJ: Thank you you are too kind. Now will you post something of yours,please? :-)

Stardust: Thank you for posting your poem Stardust. It's very nice.

To err is human
That's what they say
Forgiveness divine
For that we pray

The grass is greener
on the other side
That's what they say
but they run and hide

More blessed to give
Than to receive
Who are 'they'
Who know these things?

Snoopy: That was very nice!!

Snoopy:  Wonderful!!     What a lovely piece of writing!  

Choose
by Carl Sandburg

THE single clenched fist lifted and ready,
Or the open asking hand held out and waiting.
Choose:
For we meet by one or the other.

Snoopy: Thank you for that! It is like a breath of Spring! 

Tuesday: I havent read this board for a very long time & Im so glad that you reminded me to!
 I really love your poetry by the way! 

Tuesday:

Oh beautiful Ocean!
Your hypnotic waves
Call to Me
I feel them
Touch me gently
As you call them back
They drag me along
I am blind to the world
As the sirens sing their song

Oh sparkling sea!
I long for a life
On your infinite blue
The tails of whales
As the day starts anew
Orange and pink
A miraculous sight
As the sun sets
And becomes the night

Oh mysterious blue!
How I live for your spray
As it brushes my face
And dance with the sunlight
With beauty and grace
On you I sail
To lands afar
Adventure and freedom
Is what you are

By Devon Sklair

The White Fires of Venus
by Denis Johnson

We mourn this senseless planet of regret,
droughts, rust, rain, cadavers
that can't tell us, but I promise
you one day the white fires
of Venus shall rage: the dead,
feeling that power, shall be lifted, and each
of us will have his resurrected one to tell him,
"Greetings. You will recover
or die. The simple cure
for everything is to destroy
all the stethoscopes that will transmit
silence occasionally. The remedy for loneliness
is in learning to admit
solitude as one admits
the bayonet: gracefully,
now that already
it pierces the heart.
Living one: you move among many
dancers and don't know which
you are the shadow of;
you want to kiss your own face in the mirror
but do not approach,
knowing you must not touch one
like that. Living
one, while Venus flares
O set the cereal afire,
O the refrigerator harboring things
that live on into death unchanged."

They know all about us on Andromeda,
they peek at us, they see us
in this world illumined and pasteled
phonily like a bus station,
they are with us when the streets fall down fraught
with laundromats and each of us
closes himself in his small
San Francisco without recourse.
They see you with your face of fingerprints
carrying your instructions in gloved hands
trying to touch things, and know you
for one despairing, trying to touch the curtains,
trying to get your reflection mired in alarm tape
past the window of this then that dark
closed business establishment.
The Andromedans hear your voice like distant amusement park music
converged on by ambulance sirens
and they understand everything.
They're on your side. They forgive you.

I want to turn for a moment to those my heart loves,
who are as diamonds to the Andromedans,
who shimmer for them, lovely and useless, like diamonds:
namely, those who take their meals at soda fountains,
their expressions lodged among the drugs
and sunglasses, each gazing down too long
into the coffee as though from a ruined balcony.
O Andromedans they don't know what to do
with themselves and so they sit there
until they go home where they lie down
until they get up, and you beyond the light years know
that if sleeping is dying, then waking
is birth, and a life
is many lives. I love them because they know how
to manipulate change
in the pockets musically, these whose faces the seasons
never give a kiss, these
who are always courteous to the faces
of presumptions, the presuming streets,
the hotels, the presumption of rain in the streets.
I'm telling you it's cold inside the body that is not the body,
lonesome behind the face
that is certainly not the face
of the person one meant to become.

Tuesday: Where beest thou from?

I lie on the ground,
and stare into space,
the stars start to move,
into the shape of your face.

I see you there now,
looking down at me,
with that cute little smile,
that I like to see.

You say "close your eyes",
"tell me what you see",
I see only two people,
just you and me.

We're walking the shoreline,
with our feet getting wet,
the horizon turns pink,
as the sun starts to set.

We make love through the night,
on that white sandy shore,
then I hold you while thinking,
I could want nothing more.

Oh I wish I could be,
in that one special place,
as I lie on the ground,
and I stare into space...

- Randy Schutte -

WellyWales: Yehi zikhra barukh, may her memory be blessèd.

She’s not sexy
She’s not romantic
She’s not good in bed

She’s only beautiful

She’s not imaginative
She’s not perceptive
She’s not discriminating

She’s only a trophy on display

She’s not magical
She’s not soothing
She’s not mysterious

She’s only a moving statue, unaware, tragic, hollow

It is heartbreaking for TJ and myself to announce that BossLady (Pat) passed away on 27th June 2007, she will be badly missed by us all, we are lost for words at this moment
http://cgi.bowesonline.com/pedro.php?id=44&x=story&xid=320410

TJ: My dear friend...that is beautiful! Thank you for sharing and please continue to do so.

TJ: that brought tears to my eyes its beautiful

TJ:

I have a friend.
I don't know where she's been.
I miss her a lot.
Maybe I just forgot
To say what she means to me
I hope she is pain free
And that she is happy now.
I will never forget how
she made my day brighter
and made my load lighter.
Her biggest gift in the end
is that she is always my friend.

A TJ original thinking of my friend.

What people miss out on
Not bothering to care;
A Flick of the wrist
A Disdainful Stare...LmK ~.~
Willow Press @

Bernice: I've been selected 4 times in the last 5 years and althlugh the poems are good, I find the place to be a bit of a scam type thing for amatuers.. Me being, proudly, one of them . ~.~

Stardust: Kinda emo.

I am lost
I am alone
without my Love
so far from home

We once were part
of a greater scheme
Entwined together
Without a seam

Then destiny came
and ripped apart
that which was real
that which was wrought

I searched in vain
through time's expanse
Watched empires fall
and lovers dance

Throughout it all
I have remained
steadfast and true
to Love's regain

Until at last
with pen in hand
I find my Love
among the sand

We will embrace
True Lovers found
Ne'er more to part
Forever bound

Andre Faria: Of course not.

I´ve some nasty new poems. Can I post them?

My dog is not like other dogs.
He doesn't care to walk,
He doesn't bark, he doesn't howl.
He goes "Tick, tock. Tick, tock."

He beeps each day at half-past nine.
At noon he starts to chime.
I have a strong suspicion
that my dog can tell the time.

Another dog might run and play,
or smother me with licking,
but my dog just annoys me
with his beeping and his ticking.

Should you decide to buy a dog,
consider my remarks:
When looking for a "watch dog,"
get yourself the kind that barks.

--Kenn Nesbitt

As long as you're ebbing with their Tide
You'll get along just fine;
But try and be your Own ocean?
And they'll leave you High & Dry~LmK

Mom's smiles can brighten any moment,
Mom's hugs put joy in all our days,
Mom's love will stay with us forever
and touch our lives in precious ways...

The values you've taught,
the care you've given,
and the wonderful love you've shown,
have enriched my life
in more ways than I can count.

I Love you Mom!