Kelly Crenshaw Poet Rhyme

Notes About The Poem

guess this seems to be a season of writing for me. I thought that well was dry. I got to thinking about when I was a kid and how some of the guys came home from the “conflict” 

And how it affected them. The alcoholics I knew as a kid. The destroyed lives. The ones that never came home from Vietnam. The ones that came home but never really came home. So this one started when I was a kid I suppose but I just now finished it. For this generation I guess I could replace the word jungle with desert. And if you’re under 50 you won’t get the song references or the vibe of those times when I was just a kid.

Still 

I don’t know why what I seem to write always seems to go to the dark side almost. But oh well. This one named itself.

.

“Message In The Bottle”

Message In the Bottle

He came home from the jungle so they thought,
 A brand new man,
Left at 17 scared and alone,
With no one to hold his hand.
So he decided to tell us now
What he couldn’t say back then.
He had a plan.
And he tells us now the only way he can.
He left a message in the bottle.
He left a message in the bottle
For all the world to read
And that message in the bottle,
Only brought him pain and grief.
And that message in the bottle
Tells us about a broken man.
And the loneliness he shares within the shadows,
Of the things that might’ve been.
Of how he could not throw the stone because,
He’d seen the writing on the wall and in the the sand.
So he takes another drink and thinks,
About the girl he knew in school.
About how he wrote her everyday from the bungle in the jungle. 
Like a lovesick fool.
While his buddy dies in his arms,
She sings Soldier boy
I’ll be true to you.
Neither one of them had a clue,
About the message in the bottle.
Or that the message in the bottle would leave that girl broken hearted, 
And bitter,
 And black and blue.
When he came home,
With the message of the bottle.
He left a message in the bottle
For all the world to read
And that message in the bottle,
Only brought him pain and grief.
And I saw that man the other day,
And for the first time 
In a long time he had,
A look of peace.
And the ex wife just turned away so sad.
All his regrets, now with him in the grave.
While their son still runs the streets.
And I guess some day he’ll have to stop and read,
The message in bottle. 
It’s all his father had to leave.
He didn’t know quite how to face the pain.
He came home but his soul always stayed,
Behind the message in the bottle.
He left a message in the bottle
For all the world to read
And that message in the bottle,
Only ever brings,
pain and grief.
He found his message in the bottle.
He lost his message in a bottle.
He lost his message in the bottle.
“It’s all inside your head the other girl said”
I guess she’s never read,
The message of the bottle.

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Darlene De Beaulieu June 9, 2020 at 6:15 PM Hello Kell Crenshaw, I just read this poem. it made me feel sad. Enjoy your evening my friend. So noce to meet you.

John Hamilton June 9, 2020 at 9:19 AM Very interesting read Kelly, enjoyed the song references, obviously message in the bottle, bungle in the jungle, that was Jethro Tull no? Soldier boy that was from the 60's, alcohol ruins lives and that message does get passed on from generation to generation. Nice write feels like a song!