Notes About The Poem
1/29/2026 for Love or Bust Poetry Contest sponsored by Karen Jones
Goodbye Sweet Cassettes
Sometimes, one must say goodbye
to a true love, by and by,
and, so it seems, today's the day
I had to throw my true love away.
Perhaps you may think it strange
that the one I love is my cassette tape collection,
but consider -
she's been with me since high school,
growing with me, sharing good times and bad.
Like me, she's grown old and no longer useful.
She's just taking up space.
I must admit, I can't play her anymore.
So, one by one, I separated
the cassettes,
the plastic cases,
and the handwritten playlists.
I'll keep those playlists of carefully selected songs,
marking the milestones of my life, as keepsakes -
tenth grade, when young love consumed me,
Only Love Can Break Your Heart,
eighteen, when I went out on my own,
and pirated Al's record collection,
Hobo's Lullaby and Foreign Affairs by Tom Waits,
then to college and the dorms
old psychedelic records from San Francisco
Fresh Air, What About Me?
Dean's folk music records,
Joan Baez and the Child Ballads,
Barbara Ellen,
Johnny Cash's Christmas Album, The Christmas Spirit -
Johnny's recitation of The Ballad of the Harp Weaver
by Edna St. Vincent MiIlay.
My wife even liked some of those songs -
and then all the children's albums,
folk albums,
and children's folk albums -
Ol' Bangum,
that I'd played for my son.
Wouldn't you know, he developed his own taste in music.
Tapes copied from friends, libraries, radio shows,
too numerous to count.
I can remember all the songs, but not all the sources.
I'm amazed at how many songs
composed the soundtrack of my life.
Sometimes, one must say goodbye
to a true love, by and by,
and, so it seems, today's the day
I had to throw my true love away.
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