Long Hippie Poems
Long Hippie Poems. Below are the most popular long Hippie by PoetrySoup Members. You can search for long Hippie poems by poem length and keyword.
I hope it’s not a premonition
Of my immanent demise, but thinking today
About how far the arc of my life has come,
Makes me glad to be alive.
Nothing special or unique in that
Just odd to feel, like a cat
I’ve had more than a few lives
Packed into this one, so far,
And the range of change
Surprises me when I look at it.
Forty five years ago in college I briefly
Subscribed to the Socialist Worker’s Party paper.
Not sure why, but I think it had something to do
With expressing solidarity with a cute blond.
Now here I am on the cusp of applying for membership
In the John Birch Society, about as far
From the reality of that college hippie
As I can now imagine.
In between a mostly smooth arc stretched
Across decades of very slow maturing.
Maybe I’m just proud and stubborn
And so resistant to change
But I think it’s more a reflection of just how
Indoctrinated I was in my formative years.
It takes a lot to undo real indoctrination you know,
And I think in my case
It involved a couple of millennia instead of decades.
But anyway, I don’t think I’m quite done diving
But I can see the ocean shimmering
A great warm smile
As it comes up to meet me.
(10/16/25)
Pop, grind, slide,
Baggy pants, oversized shirt,
Who washed?
Here comes a novice with wood.
We ignore him until he wanders away.
My pal Doug is practicing a 186 change
Flipping his board over and over, landing on it.
He’s a beginner too, but for some reason it does not bother me.
Maybe because we are friends.
I wander up and give him a couple of Chinese Nollies
And a Biebelheimer
I am such a showoff on my board!
Cannot help it.
Spent a year or two practicing all these moves.
My cousin is practicing the stairs.
Ends up with a loud slam.
We clap for him.
Sounded like he broke a couple of teeth.
He gets up, pleased, takes a bow.
Hey! Watch me do this Fakie 180, the new kid yells.
We ignore him. He’s not one of us.
He does a hippie jump and lands on his nose.
I wander over to check on him.
Maybe I was too harsh.
Smoke ‘em if you got them.
Save the bottles for return.
That hippie needs a haircut.
What the hell’s a Lady Bird?
My Christmas tree had bubble lights,
My watch lit up at night.
Four-bits for my gasoline
And Cassius won the fight.
Music was a wall of sound.
A Stingray running fast,
Footsteps left upon the moon,
War’s ended, "Peace at Last".
Paychecks from the mills and mines,
From Ford and IBM.
Farming amber waves of grain
That’s how it was back then.
From all around on Friday nights
The hometown crowd, the football lights.
The pom-pom girls would dance and cheer,
I saw you there far so near.
And though my odds were slim & none
I had to try to make my run,
And never look back on the day
I had my chance and walked away.
The party went ‘til midnight,
Coors and California Dip.
The Ventures playing “Pipeline”.
You said “Let's do The Twist!”.
We dated first on New Year's Eve,
I looked into your eyes.
We tied the knot in April,
We made love until July.
But the world and I spun faster then,
You tried to be my rock.
Me, I acted like a fool.
You said “Its time we talk!“.
I thought I was your shining knight
And you my Perfect 10.
Why can't we get back to be just
Like we were back then?
Throughout time there’s joy and pain,
We can't expect things not to change.
When it was time to leave our mark,
Time after time I broke your heart.
The Texas sun goes down again.
A long day's work about to end.
Forty miles to drive back home
Flip on the light and drink alone.
Damned if I know why it all changed,
Wish I could tell you when.
I only wish that I could make it
Like it was back then.
Splinters and Beams
Stream of consciousness gleams under stark cover
Agents of psychotropic delusion blur and distort
White dust perforating a septum’s divide
Snuffed cuffed to addiction and stuffed
‘You are your downfall as you trip on your ride’
Little pinpricks endorsing a festering skin
Blisters of sinister conscience molested
‘Told you so that heroin sucks into abuse’
Meth crystals inhaled from a broken light bulb
Reignited beaming gleaming from splinters
‘Serves you right you are the scum of the earth’
Magic fungus mushrooming the doomed mind
From a domed cap on a stalk deluding insight
‘You deserve no better procured your decline’
Mary Jane weeding abysmal sativa salivating
with pleasure bleeding a buzz stoned for the thrill
‘All that hippie stuff why don’t you get real’
Flawed dust - broken needle - splintered neon -
Mouldy ingestion – disjointed joint - slushed drink
I never chased the dragon but fell of the wagon
Quite often imbibed left my shame bashed trashed
Befuddled and resolved against judgement when I now
Tend to sweep my side of the street sober and clean
Your splinter is your chip your own fragmentation
My beam is my joist my scaffold and my crossbar to level
15th April 2018
I'm a child of the '60's,
not quite a flower child,
never really a hippie
(though my ponytail
drove my uncle nuts!)
but still I ate the ever
crunchy Beatles for
breakfast, lunch, dinner
and roasted the Stones
whenever a lady came by.
I was free then or so
I told myself, free
to travel the world,
free to love and
then, inevitably,
always leave--
free to dream and
free to fail it seemed.
I owned only myself
but I owed no one--
both big mistakes
illusions really, for
we own nothing
save our souls,
we owe everything
to everyone, most
of all we owe God,
be we Baptist or
Hindu, Catholic or
Jew, Muslim or
atheist:we owe.
Most young ones
learn in time--
we are not free,
we are not strong,
we are not whole.
We hunger for
more than food,
we thirst for
more than water,
we need more
than money, and
we need more
than our minds.
We are the animal
never sated, never
full, never replete.
We are the animal
ever restless, sooo
easily bored, even
of life sometimes.
Is that why we argue
and fight, commit
pointless crimes,
end long marriages,
spurn our friends,
chase youth when
youth has become
less than a dream?
Is that really why
nations go to war,
because of boredom?
We do we always
feel we are missing
out on something?
Now that I am old,
I have no answers.
I thought I would
by now, I thought
I'd understand
myself, you, well,
everyone! And I
would know just
why I was so dumb
when I was young,
but I don't even
know why I am
so foolish old....
[written and posted 11/14/20]
My name is Harold and I wed
the greatest woman in the world,
the problem here is not my wife,
rather her sister’s little girl.
My niece had hippie parents, see,
and public school taught her some things,
things that I think weren’t all that true,
based on the huge trouble they’d bring.
I noticed first, when she was young,
she wanted to play the male sports,
tried out for football at age ten,
they kept doing things of that sort,
her mother would say that a girl
should have the same choice as a boy,
I pointed out that young girls can,
but one fact they just can’t avoid
is that young girls remain smaller,
they be smashed around in football,
and most girls don’t want to play it,
it’s not in their interest at all.
How would she learn feminine ways,
how girls and women interact?
If spare time was spent with rough boys,
hoping her small bones didn’t crack?
My sister-and-law and my niece,
said I ‘don’t want women empowered!’
But when she was bruised and black-eyed
she looked nothing more than dour.
Later on, when she reached high school,
and emerged grown from puberty,
my niece entered the dating scene,
and troubling rumors came to me
from the mouths of the local parents,
some said that my niece ‘got around,’
to keep my daughter far from her
so that she did not ‘drag her down.’
I didn’t want to believe it,
but I had once been young myself,
and when my niece came to visit
the signs were all right there to tell.
The distant look there in her eyes,
and how she talked about ‘her needs,’
that sex should be ‘empowering,’
and other such feminist screeds.
Her mother would smile and nod,
and talk about how ‘times did change,’
but beneath all the false facades
I saw in my niece lasting pain.
My daughter said she had caught her
sobbing out in the girl’s bathroom,
and said few girls befriended her,
consigned her to a social doom,
yet still she’d act like she knew all,
and never did cease to speak up,
she claimed it was empowerment,
then cried from the life of a ****...
CONCLUDES IN PART II.
Joyce Ann was unlike any other woman he had dated.
She threw new ideas to him so fast, he could barely catch them.
Had his head spinning, which was rare as he is an accountant.
His organized, plain, simple life became complicated.
She would not let him into her home after she saw his.
White walls, beige carpet, gray furniture. She laughed as she said it.
He thought this was how all houses were, but she was Bohemian.
Warning, she said when she invited him to her kitchen.
Parrots dwell in this kitchen, as did a cockatoo and two squirrels.
They were injured, she explained. I plan to release them later.
The squirrels chittered at her in an accusing way.
Or not, she said, endearing her to him even further.
His mother would never understand this one.
She was so free, spirited and wholesome.
He was shocked when his mother fell in love with her too.
I used to be a hippie back in the day, his mother said.
I grew up a child of the ’60’s
together my life and the hippie movement dawned…
now when I look back at that time I wonder…where have all the hippies gone?
Those long haired tie-dyed idealists who walked around with our feet bare
who grew our own organic vegetables…who wore flowers in our hair.
Who sang and danced and laughed…who kidded and teased and joked
whose spirituality was enhanced by all that grass we smoked.
Who ate our share of granola…who drove an old VW van
who believed in peace and love and Woodstock…
and who would never listened to The Man.
Who were excited by the universe…who were filled with loving thoughts…
who lived for today and for each other and…did I mention all that pot?
Where have all the hippies gone?…all those innocent…free-spirited pups?
I imagine what happened…happens to every generation…we hippies all grew up.
Our long hair is now white or gone…our jokes are shared in tweets
our spirits aren’t as free as they once were…and we now wear shoes upon our feet.
We still like organic vegetables…but we’ll also eat at delis
and the only pot we carry now…we carry around our bellies.
Most of us drive comfortable cars instead of those old flowered vans
Oh, we still eat our share of granola…but now we throw on a little bran.
And we certainly don’t dance as much…we never know when we might slip
for there is nothing more humiliating…than a hippie with a broken hip.
Never fear however! It may be a little harder to pick out
what was once our claims to fame
but despite the ravages of age…we are hippies just the same.
Sure life has a way of interfering and our priorities rearrange…
but I believe the spirit we brought to our generation
and our ideals have never changed.
So here’s a toast to all the hippies out there…we may be heading over the hill
but we still believe in peace and love and I’m guessing…
we always will!
Breath Of My Life
In the womb of time and life every breath I take could be
my last when I expire and exhale my last wind of change
~~ I Trust You ~~
First inspiration after having floated in my maternal cushion
exiting that safe placental place of centre attached to Mother
came pink naked forceful and screaming entering this world
thus Ilse Martha Gertrud Ida must have inspired me most
~~ You Gave Me life ~~
No breast milk for me as those were ‘modern’ times after
that awful war which could have made you bitter but soft
you were kind and nourishing kept me afloat in unconditional
~~ Love ~~
When depression hit you invited me into your life and sharing was
caring and we dispensed much more than melancholy genes when
you mended hippie jeans dreams and my bruises in the patchwork of
~~ Life ~~
I have your white wild flowing hair and your father’s bad eyes that
rebellious streak and silver highlights your sports and your passion
as you gave me direction tentative creation a questioning mind and
~~ Survival ~~
When you died and my soul buried under the duvet once more
you understood and forgave that I could not witness your final
journey I only mourned and attended from very afar and so close
~~ In Desperate Tears ~~
Thank you for loving and holding me and breathing with me through
a whirlwind of challenge and mist towards growth and compassion and
for letting me go finding own inspiration in my life so very attached
~~ To Your Heart ~~
In the 60's, dungarees
(Not jeans, if you recall)
Were worn with big wide flaring bells
And floor-length they would fall.
My favorite pair were cut real low,
Hip-hugging and skin-tight.
A fringy belt of suede made sure
My clothes looked out-of-sight.
The bottoms grazed the ground and thus
Would rip and slightly shred.
I added some embroidery;
You'd notice that instead.
Today my jeans are from the Gap
And though they're kinda flared,
They're nothing like the ones I wore
When hippie fashions fared.
But I'm no longer who I was
Back then, so young and free,
When my embroidered bells announced
The me I hoped to be.