Chance Encounter

She was ravenous for it.
He had hit the jackpot.
She knew of a spot in the vicinity.
He was a stranger.
She had money.
He was broke and thumbing.
She paid for the no-tell-motel.
He now believed in God.
She was a wild-child.
He only tried to keep up.
She assaulted the manmeat.
He thought he would die.
She wolfed it down.
His knees were weak.
She licked the rest.
He lay back on the bed.
She slurped greedily at the feast.
He rolled his eyes and grinned.
She gave him the back door.
He was shocked but not much.
She was gutted with want.
He licked off her sweat.
Her husband broke down the door.
He screamed himself awake.

A Girl So Blue

 

We knew a girl who was so blue.

Why was she sad we never knew.
We wondered but we had no clue.

Some said she was sad for a man,
Whispers about a girl, Diane,
Who left her and moved to Japan,
We never knew if it were true.

She never smiled and would not laugh,
Walked around like a half-sick calf,
And had a neck like a giraffe,
It always looked a bit askew.

One day she up and went away,
She left a note and signed it Mae,
Said it was time for her to stray,
Searching for llama's in Peru.

©March 15, 2006 / Jerry Pat Bolton

A Date For Mona

When he gave any thought at all,
to Mona's lovely smile he bawled.
He couldn't help that the tears fell,
as he held his daughter Michelle.

Moments, when all hope was gone,
insanity sneaked in quiet like a yawn.
Where once he was happy and free,
a dark cloud had covered all reality.

The bedroom, that room of amour,
locked, bolted, nailed shut, the door.
Windows painted black sun not let in,
sealed shut  like the wall of Berlin.

The land, the countryside did not alter,
only his heart, cold, hard like Gibraltar.
Passiveness and all the normal judgment,
were cast aside with intellectual descent.

He lay on a bed of nails, his body bled,
punishment for living with Mona dead.
He lived in filth, his mind on one issue,
his brain zeroed in on what he had to do.

The moon, so bright, so vast and so pale,
shinned on the paper he read like Braille.
A finger on each letter, then on a word.
to not believe its message was absurd.

A mild and quiet man had been his way,
but he felt like he had been betrayed.
A tempest so awful had befallen him,
causing a plan to fight but not in a gym.

Man, when pushed can and will hit back,
that is why this man was in this evil shack.
The map in his shaking hand lit by candle,
was given to him by one wearing sandals.

He walked all night, the moon did its part,
hid behind clouds, he'd memorized the chart.
The arid wind stung his face as he trod,
alone, but armed, with the grace of God.

Armies had searched and came up short,
but tonight he was going to hold court.
It was the time, tonight was for Mona,
last time he saw her she wore a kimono.

He was not alone on the desert tonight,
his heart fluttered as he trailed his flight.
Hearing his quarry's shallow gasp, his panic
clear, he had come for him across the Atlantic.

He was there to put to death an evil man,
who had bragged about his killing plan.
Those in the World Trade Towers for one,
Pentagon, woods of Pennsylvania he'd done.

The man no longer ran, he was worn down,
held out his hands, pleading, looking around.
His hands found the throat of Osama bin Laden,
as he died, he cried like a coy maiden.

©March 7, 2004 / Jerry Pat Bolton

A Female Unknown

They found her sprawled in the alley
Dead.  Asleep in the Lily of the Valley
Obscene and cold, flat on her back
All for a damn hit of ten dollar crack.

Beneath the grime and blood and gore
The innocence, before she was a whore
Could not be seen, she met her maker
A one hundred percent street-wise faker.

Dead blue eyes, peroxide hair, a wild vine
Earrings in her nose, tongue, a defiant sign
To the world that she's a wild child
Who long ago learned how not to smile.

The one thing which stood out about her
Where everything thing else was a blur
A silver cross lay obscenely under her throat.
It looked out of place, as would a sable coat.

A silver cross, from her unknown past?
A present from someone she held onto fast?
A detective, hardened to scenes such as this
He shuddered, covered her with a low hiss.

Blue strobe lights lit up the night near the dump
The police milled around the unmoving lump
Trying to maintain, it was an awful test
The sheet over her body outlined her breast.

Each man, woman, working the dreadful scene
Spoke tersely about the fallen sex queen
Many times they had been called out in the night
To look at and ponder such similar sights.

How much can one take before giving in
To horror and begin living for a bottle of gin?
The one lying so still, sculptured by a fiends
Wicked hand carving out her end, not clean.

More honest in death than living the life she did
She was much more than a whore on the skids
My, God, a detective screamed at the slaughter
Oh please, don't let this happen to my daughter.


©August 4, 2003 / Jerry Pat Bolton

Betty Boop Was A Slut

This may come as a big surprise but
Betty Boop was an out-and-out slut.
How she fooled them all, it was a joke,
She would never turn down any bloke.

Her life of depravity you see
Started with Dick (whadda name) Tracy.
After scouring the city for crime,
Upon his nightstick Betty did climb.

Oh my, yes, Betty was such a mess
Just a smile and she would drop that dress.
Moon Mulligan had her to play with,
Or in a pinch she'd take Snuffy Smith.

The Boop had Flash Gordon, the spaceman,
Taught him more ways than a moonbeam can.
It was all to make Steve Canyon mad,
Oh, Betty was a mean one; so sad.

She didn't cull, she welcomed them all,
Even rumors about Olive Oyl.
A wild child, she lived life at full tilt,
She could, you know, look how she was built.

Joe Palooka found he could not fight
With Betty, she had an overbite.
That made it interesting and oral,
When all done the men had no quarrel.

She starred in Tijuana Bibles
And Mary Worth sued her for libel.
Grabbed Popeye for a sexual brawl,
Then told everybody he was small.

A gourmet lass, she worked like a chef
Even double-teamed old Mutt and Jeff.
Batman too, he wrote her a letter,
She snickered, said Robin was better.

Shared her slut title with Nancy Drew,
Between the two they had quite a queue.
Blondie gave her a run, did not shirk,
Hurrying Dagwood, quick off to work.

Loving the man of steel was her plight,
Why not, it was hard as Kryptonite?
What a pitiful shape she was in,
Superman was in love with Betty's twin.

©February 14, 2005 / Jerry Pat Bolton

Being There

I squirted red wine
From a goatskin flask
In a besotted Greek salute to
Bacchus, god of wine and revelry.
    But I wasn’t there.

I wore fine linen garments, powder in my hair,
A manly rite of passage
In perverted old Europe
And stepped gracefully to the
Minuet with Lucrezia Borgia.
    But I wasn’t there.

I jitterbugged in the Speakeasy
With the Flappers of Chicago,
Kicking high and lovin’ hard
On bathtub gin, free expression
And Marxists philosophy.
    But I wasn’t there.

I dug the scene at The Duplex,
Kerouac’s favorite watering hole
With Ginzberg spewing righteous
Beatnik intellect there in
Greenwich Village.
    But I wasn’t there.

I draped love beads
Round my neck,
Standing among the faithful
Digging Janis in San Francisco with
Big Brother and the Holding Company.
    But I wasn’t there.

    But I’ll be there in the flesh,
Decked out in my costume of choice
At the World’s First United Mardi Gras
Celebration in the Mojave Desert,
Puking on Gila Monsters and
Chasing Roadrunners.

Apostrophé

I can converse with you, apostrophe,
for you see we both plot to hide the key
ingredients in a relationship,
when you are used, certain letters are skipped.

There are times I feel I am in the dark,
like, when I get used to seeing your mark,
making a word not really a word, see,
just like I'm not who I'm supposed to be.

An inverted slant is all that you are,
you make a word obscene, give it a scar,
gullible patrons of the written word,
don't stop to think that you might be absurd.

Ah, but we are kinsman, that is a fact,
look at me, you only see the abstract.
I'm saying we are both fraudulent sluts,
subtracting our total, we are just mutts.

Rogues that we are, we're not unlike the rest,
giving the world something for them to guess.
You and your inverted slant, gives you style,
like you, I hide parts of me with a smile.

©March 9, 2006 / Jerry Pat Bolton

Clear Water

    turbulent sixties
    CCR had clear water
    but it all dried up

    ©April 20, 2006

Tricks

three of them

drinking hard liquor

barely weaned

spoke to me in language

they thought was adult

picking up what they might have heard their fathers say

braggadocio

trying to make an impression

on me

the whore

or maybe to each other

didn't matter

they were having a good time

or thought they were

cracking jokes

laughing loudly and insanely

high-fiving each other

drew straws to see who'd go first

and last

boasting about what they had to give me

I went along with it

I'm a whore

that's what I was in the cheap hotel room to do

whatever they wanted

soon the room stood silent

it was time

the two who wasn't first

left

leaving the one who'd been loudest

joked the rudest

leader of the pack I guess

thing is

he went speechless without his buddies

I undressed

he didn't

he wouldn't, I think he was gay

begged me not to tell

gave me everything he had in his wallet

not to tell

we waited the right amount of time

he left

could hear him talking about how good it was

the second one came

then the last

neither of them had a problem

"doing" it

even so I quite understood

they fantasized I was their mother

©December 4, 2010 / Jerry Pat Bolton

The Guys

     she is petite

     wears little girls clothes if she wants to

     fresh-scrubbed-appearing face

     popular with the guys

     and . . . why . . . not

     never bothers me

     the guys

     with their perfumed lower regions

     they fuck her

     they do

     but don't know how to make love to her

     she told me they

     one and all

     like to position themselves

     so they can watch their performance

     in mirrors

     egomaniacal male harlots

     why would I worry

     she needs to prove something to herself

     some dark thing

     she hides

     then comes home to me

     orally inclined to swallow me dry

     no

     I don't mind the guys

     ©November 23, 2010 / Jerry Pat Bolton

Blues Creeps In (The Diatelle)

 fear

snuck in

it had been
hid until now
it smiles and then it grins
I have to wipe my fevered brow
fear I refuse entrance, I won't allow
it wants to torture me for things I did back then
this time fear will not find me I avow
I am not like I was back when
living for pills and gin
please tell me how
blank out sin
its twin
tear

©May 30, 2006

A Fairie Tale

This was written for a long-lost daughter who picked up the phone one day and made me the happiest father in the world. My happiness was marred when I found out that this beautiful daughter was a slave to cocaine.

A Fairie Tale

Once upon a time in a far off land called Temptationville there lived a beautiful princess named Love.

Princess Love was adored by her father who lived across the big mountain in a valley named Lonely. His name was Forgetmenot. Love did not know her father. Princess Love lived in a big castle with King Sunflower and her mother, Queen Rose.

Everyone in Temptationville worshipped Princess Love. She lived in grandiose style. She was showered with gifts from the people of the countryside. Princess Love was so happy. Everyday was her own special holiday.

On her sixteenth birthday, King Sunflower and Queen Rose gave her the biggest birthday party ever given in Temptationville. All the people came bearing gifts for the lovely princess.

There was dancing in the streets and joyous adulation for the beautiful Princess Love. The people spread their gifts in front of the Gift-Giving Temple. Everyone was so happy because they were able to show their feelings for Princess Love.

Forgetmenot left the Valley of Lonely and came down the big mountain to watch. All Forgetmenot could bring as a gift was the Special Feeling within his heart. Forgetmenot was very poor.

As the happy people piled their gifts before the Gift-Giving Temple, Forgetmenot stood off to the side and watched with gladness in his heart. The feeling was almost unbearable. Each time someone presented their gift, Forgetmenot reached across the void with the Special Feeling in his heart and blessed it.

Princess Love did not know who Forgetmenot was. Forgetmenot left Temptationville many years before to climb the big mountain to the Valley of Lonely to live.

After everyone had placed their gifts at the Gift-Giving Temple, he saw one man approach the Gift-Giving Temple alone. He was a tall and handsome man, but he walked with an aloofness, and an arrogance which made him stand out from everyone else.

But the handsome stranger was not happy like the rest of the people, although there was a thin, venomous smile on his face. Forgetmenot understood there was something foreboding in the way he approached the Gift-Giving Temple.

The handsome stranger placed his gift to the side of all the other gifts. Then he straightened up and laughed aloud. A heinous laugh. He bowed low before Princess Love and left. Forgetmenot could not reach across with the Special Feeling in his heart to bless this gift. He felt wickedness within the brightly wrapped package.

Princess Love began opening the beautiful things that had been left for her. Princess Love was so happy.

Each present she opened seemed to come alive in her hands with a feeling she had never felt before. After all her gifts were opened and she turned to leave, the package the handsome stranger brought caught her eye. Princess Love bent down to open it. On top of the package lay a small card. On it was written:

Happy Sixteenth Birthday from Count Cacti.

Princess Love reached inside the box to retrieve her gift. She pulled her hand back with a start and a small cry of pain. Something had pricked her finger and blood dripped slowly from it. Princess Love cried out again and King Sunflower and Queen Rose came and wiped the blood from her finger and held her as she wept.

Even as Princess Love cried, she felt a sudden burst of energy springing from within her, which was at first, very scary. She overcame her fright and allowed the strange sensation to fill her whole being.

She pulled away from the embrace of King Sunflower and Queen Rose. Her little heart was pounding at an alarming rate and she felt as though she knew . . . She wasn’t quite sure what she thought she knew, but she suddenly felt she knew far more than anyone else in Temptationville. Quite without realizing why Princess Love understood that she, and she alone, was aware of things no one else could comprehend. She felt so . . . superior to the rest of the people.

Princess Love ran back to the box which held her present. For by now, as far as she was concerned, it was the only present she cared about. She grabbed the box, ignoring pleas from King Sunflower and Queen Rose, she ran to the castle and to her room with her treasure.

The odd-shaped, prickly gift Princess Love took with her became her all. She found that when she would prick herself with the spiny plant, the world of Temptationville, and all its happy people dissolved into pettiness and contempt.

Everyday activities, which once seemed so beautiful, now spawned rejection from Princess Love. It was as if everyone were like children at play. Playing childish games of life. It was all so very beneath her now.

Princess Love acquired such an attitude she was unable to even converse with anyone about anything. No one seemed to be able to identify with her and couldn’t understand her strange ways. She just thought they were absurd.

Everyone, that is, except Count Cacti.

The Count returned to her when she needed him the most.

And Princess Love found that she needed him often, because each time she pricked herself with the spiny, needle-sharp barb, it would fall from the plant it and become useless. And every day she needed more and more of the self-inflected wounds for her body and soul. But it always seemed that when the plant was about to become barren of the little prickly points Count Cacti would show up with another one.

He would only bring one plant at a time, however, and Princess Love wanted more of them because she felt insecure without it. The plant had become her world.

On Princess Love’s twenty-first birthday she decreed to the people of Temptationville that they should bring only the small, spiny plant for presents and nothing else.

Princess Love needed to know that she would have an endless supply of the special plant which had become her only reason to live. And by her decree, she would not have to worry anymore.

The day of her birthday arrived and all the people of Temptationville arrived with their gifts. Princess Love watched the somber people from her window, high in the castle. There was no laughing and dancing. The people of Temptationville were sad.

King Sunflower and Queen Rose stood before the people with bowed heads and tear-stained eyes. They were also saddened by Princess Love’s strange enchantment with the little plant.

All the gifts had been laid round the Gift-Giving Temple and the people had silently departed.

Except one man who Princess Love did not know, but that Queen Rose recognized as Forgetmenot.

Forgetmenot had come down from the mountain from the Valley of Lonely again for his daughter’s twenty-first birthday.

This time he brought her a present. A Magic Mirror.

Forgetmenot walked to the Gift-Giving Temple and looked up at Princess Love as she watched from her window. He placed the Magic Mirror next to the many little plants the people had brought. Then he rose and looked again at Princess Love before leaving.

 Princess Love, incensed by this strange, tattered man who dared not bring her the cherished spiny plant she so desired, ran from the castle to the Gift-Giving Temple to confront him.

She picked up the Magic Mirror, intending to smash it to the ground.  Before she did so, she looked into it. The Magic Mirror seemed to explode her image from within it straight into her very soul. She looked at her face staring back, and from somewhere deep within herself came the terrible truth.

The truth of who she was.

The truth of who she used to be.

The truth of who she had become.

It was all so real, and the moment weighed upon her. The past five years seemed like an awful nightmare.

Then Queen Rose came to Princess Love and told her who the man was that left the Magic Mirror.

Princess Love ran after him.

Forgetmenot and Princess Love walked back to the Gift-Giving Temple and set fire to the hundreds of tiny plants.

Forgetmenot climbed back up the big mountain to the Valley of Lonely, but now Princess Love talked to him with her Magic Mirror.

She had broken her Magic Mirror in half, so that now they both had one. And they talked to each other from Temptationville across the big mountain to the Valley of Lonely.

And they all lived happily every after.

Being There

I squirted red wine
From a goatskin flask
In a besotted Greek salute to
Bacchus, god of wine and revelry.
    But I wasn’t there.

I wore fine linen garments, powder in my hair,
A manly rite of passage
In perverted old Europe
And stepped gracefully to the
Minuet with Lucrezia Borgia.
    But I wasn’t there.

I jitterbugged in the Speakeasy
With the Flappers of Chicago,
Kicking high and lovin’ hard
On bathtub gin, free expression
And Marxists philosophy.
    But I wasn’t there.

I dug the scene at The Duplex,
Kerouac’s favorite watering hole
With Ginzberg spewing righteous
Beatnik intellect in
Greenwich Village.
    But I wasn’t there.

I draped love beads
Round my neck,
Standing among the faithful
Digging Janis in San Francisco with
Big Brother and the Holding Company.
    But I wasn’t there.

    I’ll be there in the flesh,
Decked out in my costume of choice
At the World’s First United Mardi Gras
Celebration in the Mojave Desert,
Puking on Gila Monsters and
Chasing Roadrunners.

An Easter Moon

   The moon looks so much different
   as I sit, alone and quiet;
   it comforts me as never before.
   It's almost white bright,
   casting shadows as I lean against
   this building.

   Never noticed a moon shadow
   in the swamps of Louisiana,
   guess I was too busy to see.
   The stillness around me is creepy,
   I can't look at the stars
   they seem to be falling.

   It's this beautiful moon, man,
   I conjure up odd thoughts
   of where, when, and why.
   You ever been in a place
   where everything smelled
   unfamiliar, strange and, well, strange?

   On this Easter morning,
   this place makes me think of
   The Garden of Gethsemane.
   The old song,
   I Come To The Garden Alone,
   sorta wells up my eyes, don't know why.

   Ah, but the Easter Moon
   is not a sad sight, no,
   brings to mind lively Easter Bonnets.
   Houses have a soft glow
   beneath dangling stars,
   look, there, a shooting one.

   Far away a dog barks timidly,
   don't see many dogs here,
   I don't think they like them.
   I bring my hands in front of my face,
   stare as though
   I see a mirror reflection.

   A strange face, a strange land,
   hands calloused, bloody,
   what happened?
   My body clenches, desires
   woman,
   I have not loved yet.

   Sitting beneath the stars,
   virginal in amour,
   knowing not woman's flesh.
   If I close my eyes, will I awake
   more God-like,
   without blemish, pure?

   I sigh,
   loudly, remembering
   the melody of an oldie but a goodie.
   I'm very tired, wish it
   would rain, wash away the stench
   of rotting meat; theirs and ours.

   I watch the Easter Moon,
   oh, there!  Again!  Another shooting star,
   or is it the enemy's mortar shells?

   ©April 9, 2004 / Jerry Pat Bolton