mutton-chop sideburns
bellbottoms... flowery, flared
chic… chains and chest hairs
My life's been fine without you -- really has.
A Belgian bar has opened in the square,
and weekends, we do beer and tapas there,
then Malcolm and Elaine's place, for some jazz
and Jamieson's. May in Cortes -- what a blast!
Right now, I'm growing sideburns! Summer hols,
we'll all dress up as bandits and their molls!
I've never laughed so much. Who needs the past?
Yet sometimes, when the lake frowns in the rain,
or April squalls tug blossoms from the trees,
I think of you. This sadness preordained,
like plane trees pollarded, proud amputees
shorn of their plumes, emerges, stark and strange:
and I know then. Some things will never change.
I should not be far away
For a thousands of miles
Distance permeates each day
Its so hard to bear sometimes
You are right, I could be better
We may not have ever met
More a purposeful go-getter
I could be, and where I’m at
Could have been a near county
Than a country ruled by mad
Could have had a stash of bounty
Could have been a wealthy lad..
Couldn’t have been a bachelor
Who wears terrible sideburns
You would look and say oh no
We shall never come to terms
But to love you like I do
Is the only way to be
Three notes fit in I love you -
Couldn’t be anyone but me.
The sideburns of the Maples
Turned another color in early October
I look in my Roman bathroom mirror
Person reflected is a stranger to me
The green children
No more than sprouts finding their blossoms
Are impossibly older than me
More ancient than the planet’s lore
Poor last good kids
Hunched over and limping
Faithfully lacing duty to their boots
Strapping chores across their shoulders
They walk the cobblestone Earth
Knowing the truth
As a crown of thorns upon their heads
Anxiously crying
Father
Do not forgive them
For they knew
Exactly what they were doing.
Peace and love lots of slang man
I'm feeling groovy tonight
I was a flower child still stand
wishing we could all unite
although they protested
in their maxi dresses
and were getting arrested
I would've avoided those messes
mag wheels and jacked up cars
green shaggy carpet
matching kitchen appliances with bars
long hair and sideburns artists
silver trees color wheels
did glow with their stacks
mini-skirts flashing appeals
burning bras with bare backs
just to experience how it feels
custom vans with daisies
parents with wigs toupees
rose colored glasses not crazies
an era that never went out fun days
An Aunties Wedding
There was an empty Players box
flattened beneath the dancers
a scent of receding tide on the quay
swept, green, slick as hair oil
bound by ginger sideburns
your dress shaped like a rocket to the moon
a wigwam to play in days before the day
I was five in a white wool suit
bony kneed refused to board her train
or travel the cold tiled floor
to her shining altar
I bet she never noticed the tramps outside the door
or your sisters child that day
now you are chatteringly old – still unhappy
I met you last Saturday
a little boy from nineteen sixty four
Elvis Presley high on drugs
with gyrating hips and shrugs
sang many a great song
chubby cheeks, sideburns long
ere guitar strings pulled all plugs.
~08/20/18
~Celebrity limerick contest
by Tania Kitchin
Please don't say Vegas.
We're halfway between Durban and Bloem',
so don't say Vegas, okay ?
Thankfully you found a way, reluctantly,
to settle on the right answer
without saying it out loud.
All the way to the beach,
so I hopped in, and I didn't laugh.
I introduced myself
and for an awkward moment
you introduced neither
yourself nor that guy you wanted to be.
Perhaps you didn't want to introduce
yourself, anonymous as me.
And you didn't need to introduce him,
how could I possibly not know his name ?
Then, after a moment of that,
you introduced him anyways.
It would be a long, silly drive.
You said it. Your voice was not unconvincing,
you had it pretty much down.
You actually said the name,
as if you wanted us both to believe it
but knew that neither of us did.
I'd never seen sideburns so thick,
or hair so black and slick,
the sunglasses looked the part too.
The rest of it was not as flamboyant
as The King would have wanted it to be.
I was friendly and nice
and made sure not to laugh,
but we both knew the truth,
and I really wanted
to be far from Bloem' today.
16th August 2018
There once was a crooner with sideburns
Whose lips howled and hips churned as he turned
His first name was Elvis
They called him "The Pelvis"
Until the day he flamed out, crashed and burned
Jimi Hendrix sure wowed 'em at Woodstock
Created a new form of acid-rock
He performed Purple Haze
In a drug-induced daze
Star-Spangled Banner in permanent shock
And lest we forget Janis Joplin
Whose songs really kept her fans hoppin'
She went on a spree
With Bobby McGee
Then she OD'd, which ended her boppin'
These three heroes all met similar fates
Thinking themselves immortally great
They took liberties
With their minds and bodies
Canceling their remaining concert dates
My life's been fine without you -- really has.
A Belgian bar has opened in the square,
and weekends, we do beer and tapas there,
then Malcolm and Elaine's place, for some jazz
and Jamieson's. May in Cortes -- what a blast!
Right now, I'm growing sideburns! Summer hols,
we'll all dress up as bandits and their molls!
I've never laughed so much. Who needs the past?
Yet sometimes, when the lake frowns in the rain,
or April squalls tug blossoms from the trees,
I think of you. This sadness preordained,
like plane trees pollarded, proud amputees
shorn of their plumes, emerges, stark and strange:
and I know then. Some things will never change.
Reserved
By Feo.
In a bar on Avenue A, on the television screen a woman is giving head,
There's couples everywhere, affectionate couples, kissing and drinking together,
I'm at the bar alone waiting for someone who never shows up,
Standing out, cause I'm a writer,
2 minutes I'm told,
Drinking alone, might as well drink at home,
The **** on the screen is old vaudeville and sideburns,
Anarchy in the jukebox, anarchy in my drink,
The bartenders night was made by a regular and company,
I write poems at bars and wait for no company,
Surrounded on the weekend, doing what I could have done alone,
I can't write alone, it's a habit not yet developed,
I'm a habit who tips well.
The 50’s are special to me
Started High School in ‘52
Wore shrink tight jeans and cowboy boots
Long hair ducktails and sideburns too
Rock and Roll music was “the thing”
Meet your buddies with a high five
The girls started looking good to me
That’s when bop dancing came alive
Buddy Holly, Little Richard
Elvis Presley and the rest
I’d listened to them all the time
Soon Bebop music was the best
Got a job at the Trading Post
Learned to drive and got my first car
Fender skirts and a necking knob
And a muffler that sounded bazaar
Then girls suddenly caught my eye
Double dates to the drive-in movies
Smooching when parked on lover’s lane
A French kiss was something groovy
Out of college in ‘59
And from then right up to today
When I think about the 50’s
I just grin, what else can I say?
Flower children
colors galore
summer concerts- screaming crowds
warm beaches - California girls
surfin boys
music- noise
long hair
colored skirts
sideburns long- shirts off
blue jeans - bare feet
people power
world peace
swirling psychedelic colors- smoking magic mushrooms
the power of love- world message
entranced by the magical journey
musical bands- rock and roll hot
crowds screaming- English invasion
girls swooning- songs rockin'
flower power
sixties blast
twentynet-60's
Phyllis Babcock
My childhood memories of the 1970s in England
Flared trousers
Platform shoes
Long hair, sideburns, beards
Abba and beautiful Agnetha
Raleigh Chopper
The Exorcist
Open shirts
Lava lamps
John Travolta and Olivia Newton John
Starsky and Hutch and Charlie’s Angels
Star Wars
Decimal currency
Three piece suits, long collared blouses
Hendrix, Callas, Elvis and Bolan die
Carry on films with Sid James
Brut and Hai Karate
David and Angie Bowie
Margaret Thatcher
Workers strikes
Jack Horne for Nette's TwentyNet contest
Like a blustering old man the
storm spews snow epitaphs of disregard
for the minions of man.
A light froth falls from the north
dry and distant making
sideburns, muttonchops on the bark
of barren tree trunks.
The windward side of the trees
applying downward weight of snow
tilting with dismay.
Yet, the day calls to the young
and through slamming back doors they run
sleds, and saucers in their bundled arms
ah... for my ole flexible flyer!
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