Tag Archives: Love

YOU ARE THE U IN HOUSTON TO ME

Audio Recordings, Relationships, Travel / tagged , / / by

YOU ARE THE U IN HOUSTON TO ME

How could I ever leave you love
if you didn’t live in Houston

If it wasn’t for the humid swamp
and the trash along the bayou
how could I say good-bye to you

You know I love you dearly
and it ain’t you that makes me run
but Houston traffic’s far from fun
and every Bubba’s got a gun

Yet even with all of that
and the country’s worst damn air
you know that I’ll keep coming back
as long as you are there

And I’ll keep leaving Houston too
after a muggy smoggy day or two

One of these days I hope you know
I’ll take you with me when I go

LOUIS AND SUZANNE

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LOUIS AND SUZANNE

Suzanne gets cancer
she gets cancer real bad

The doctors get out their big guns
They wage war with everything they’ve got

The cancer laughs at the doctors
It breaks out on many new fronts

The doctors, defeated, suggest surrender
Louis and Suzanne go to Mexico instead

Suzanne drinks fresh juices and does cleanses
Louis quits his job and takes care of Suzanne

Suzanne gets well

Louis takes care of many people
He took care of people in asbestos mines

For years he has not slept well
and he does not breathe well in the mornings

The doctors are treating him for sleep apnoea
Early this year he has a bad cough

The doctors do X-rays, Louis has cancer
Too much asbestos, ten years growing

It is too late for the doctors, or Mexico
Louis dies, life is funny

FOR DEBBIE AND DAD

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FOR DEBBIE AND DAD
– by Carolyn Meili

As America reeled
in its new found vulnerability
Its myths exploding over and over
on wide-screen TV

You found a friend
perhaps the only one I have ever seen
who demanded your best
but not your sympathy

Now, in her absence
we discover our own vulnerability

and the strength in it

I watched the moon tonight
and she is full
Beaming among us

(written by my daughter Carolyn Meili, who met Debbie a week before Debbie’s death. Said she had never made and lost a friend so fast)

DEBBIE OH DEBBIE

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DEBBIE OH DEBBIE

Debbie oh Debbie
are you thinking of going away
because no one ever asked you
hard enough to stay

Debbie oh Debbie
were you always so beautiful strong
that no one ever thought to carry you along

Debbie oh Debbie
the brave wolf that still shows its throat
and bleeds inside of its coat

Debbie oh Debbie had we but loved
less wisely, but more well
who can tell who can tell

Debbie oh Debbie
are you thinking of going away
because I never asked you hard enough to stay

FEEDING THE SOUL AT VARGOS

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FEEDING THE SOUL AT VARGOS
(for Debbie)

The soul is fed in many ways

Walking
on a sunny Easter Sunday
in Vargos gardens with the one you love

Marveling as peacocks surround us
and salute that love

Meeting by chance
your surgeon ally in the cancer fight

Sitting by the window
breaking bread in gratitude for it all

JUDY

Poems about Poetry, Relationships / tagged , , , , , / / by

JUDY

Judy was a beauty
tall and blonde and shy
early this month she decided to die

The soft wise eyes, the curling lashes
all now ashes

We have been friends for twenty years
hugs and coffee when in town, cards when far away

And always the latest poetry

She said it was important, and it touched her
in places nothing and no one else could reach

Three years ago
I put my neck in a green eyed noose

I sent no cards, I did not call

I do not know if I could have saved her
though touch and poetry have been known to

I only know I hate what I did and didn’t do
I only know that she drowned out there alone
I only know it was a long time since I had thrown her a line

THE TWINKLE

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THE TWINKLE
(Eulogy at Father’s funeral)

There is a thing about light
no matter where it starts it never stops
even if it takes a million years
to get from the twinkling stars to here

There was a twinkle in the eyes of this man
A twinkle of innocent mischief and inner joy
greeting every man and woman
every girl and boy

When you saw it you knew that he liked you
and never doubted that you’d like him too

AND HE WAS RIGHT

Because there is a thing about light

A million years from now
and no one knows how far
they will see it on some star

FATHER’S POEM

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FATHER’S POEM

My father’s poems
did not come down to us on paper

He was eight years old when his mother died
his youngest brother not yet three

They say he adopted the care
of the sweet sad child
and told him a story each night

Night after night after night

New stories he made up each night

And he would gather him up in the story
and hold him there
until he slept

ROBERTA’S WEDDING

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ROBERTA’S WEDDING

When I returned from anywhere by air

Roberta would run
full out across the crowded floor
take a gymnast’s leap ten feet away
and fly through the air into my arms

So pure a show it was of joy and love
so affirming of the goodness of all life
so full of youth’s unquestioned faith
she would be safely caught and held

that travelers all around

would stand in awe

Today she runs across a crowded floor
and leaps with equal joy
into the arms of another man with
equal trust she will be safely caught and held

And now I see what all those others saw

and I stand back in awe

A NEW WORD

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A NEW WORD

We need a new word

A word for how you feel about someone
that you want to hang around with all of the time

I mean really want to be with every night and day

A word for that feeling that makes your heart sing
every time you see them

Causes a warm smile to rise every time you think of
them

Love doesn’t quite do it anymore
it has been battered and bruised and bled too often

A word for that feeling that where you meet them is
in a land of
acceptance, filled with air so light that fear cannot
breathe it

Friend won’t do, even though
friends are people you can count on, and who can count on
you,

And brother this and brother that, or sister this and
sister that are now used by people who have nothing
more in common than a perceived common enemy

No, we need a new word

Something as fresh and clean and bright and pure and
as innocent as a baby’s chortling laugh

Yes we need a new word and we need it bad

I sure hope we don’t find it