Long Hair

Of course you want babies like all your friends

Only I will be the one babysitting

While you dance out the night

With married men who woke up that morning

To find they had married their mother

To divert to the Shangri La night club

To try and get their leg over a piece of easy

To find themselves confronted by you and

Your gaggle of girls

Who only want him to spend his cash

On their expenses drinks and sniffing coke

For a quick grope of their tits

And a little arse slapping

You arrive home a little tipsy

Creep into the bedroom and undress

To find you are missing your wonder bra

Sliding into our king size bed

Smelling of stale alcohol and cigarette smoke

I wake and ask if you had a good night

Yes you reply just me and the girls

Not knowing that in the morning

You will have to hide the hickey on you pearl white neck
With layersof foundation cream

Oh have you will wish you still had long hair

Just a cup of tea

You know you have reached rock bottom

When your life is like the spokes of a bicycle wheel

Forty threads radiating our from the core of you

Each thin strand dysfunctional of your fragile existence

To a watching world

All it takes is a branch or drum stick to unbalance your eco system of life

The along comes a repairman

A do-gooder trying to get into heaven

He offers you a quick fix if you sing his song

And contribute to lavish life style

At first you accept, well you can’t go any lower

But then you see the small print hidden behind

The glossy pictures of the current instant messiah

You find yourself wandering the lonely streets

Filled with grey houses, even the stray dogs have deserted your space

You lay your head on the stone step of the towns closed orphanage

Wishing you were a child and they would take you in.

As the red moon drifts across the night sky.

You dreams of food and feathers

The food to fill your empty belly so the pain is over
The feathers to fill a bed for you sink into

The reality of a cold wet step breaks the pleasantries of the night dreams

The neighborhood dog annoyed of your presence marks his territory

You wake from the aroma foul eating away inside your nostrils

The dog of unknown parentage looks pathetically at you as though it has done nothing wrong

It is then you seethe light

A star above a garage

You hobble towards it, the holy family,

A new baby could be waiting wrapped in grease and oil stain blanket

Do-gooders are back giving away soup and sandwiches 

Your stomach filled a warm feeling emits from within

A young man offers you a hot cup of tea

His face familiar, his smile awakening

“Dad”, the words slip from his mouth

In the darkness of the garage he hugs you, not letting go

The home you seek has found you

The family you lost regained

You were just looking in the wrong place.

Less we forget

I weep for those who visit the National Cemetery to remember the fallen

They are not a few but many

The shame and blame must be on those who sent the young to war

To fight the battles for corporate interests

So the rich son’s can continue their Ivy League education

Then become the pillars of finance and commerce

While the son’s of the middle class

Are lured by a better life and a free education

These are the war hero’s, who use modern technology

To suppress obsessed religious warriors

In the dry hot desert of Iraq, or the barren hills of Afghanistan

These boys to men dodged the sniper, the roadside bombs

Only to return home with missing limbs

Or in a flag draped body bag

We should revolt against the power that be and demand peace and freedom

Tell them if they want to play war then buy an XBox 360

And to remember that each life lost

On the worlds multitude of battle fields

Is some ones child, a husband, a father

And the politicians don’t have the right to play God with other peoples lives.

The dawn of reality

My blood pressure rises as I think about the politicians

Those corrupt men and women

In Washington, Sacramento and other cities

Lining their pockets with bribes from corporate lobbyists

To vote in favor of industrial destroyers of our planet

Is there no one who can stand up and be honest

What happened to the truth we the people expect

Shall we continue in ignorance of what is really happening

While those who have power over us

Rewrite history to fulfill their family dynasties

And the dreams of a demented few

One vote for one man means nothing
Not even counting the mail in vote

Unless it is followed by financial endorsement

Can the working man on minimum wage pay the piper

Even a revolution won’t change the status quo 

For without the dollar you and I are nothing more than cannon fodder

Made ready for the next CIA created war

The human shields of corporate states

Where democracy lies beneath the rubble of the republic

My allegiance is to the child who see that the rich emperor

The talentless television celebrity who has no clothes but an expensive veneer

To hide the truth, the media distraction

To become the puppets for the ruling masters

We cannot fight to win

Only resist until all our energy is taken from us, by the state police

On January 20 1981 at 11:57am the old world died

Our freedom and destiny was buried 

When they obscured the truth and the American flag was draped

Across the window of the world

Language Barrier

The disheveled man

His stained shirt sticking out

Of his ten sizes to big trousers

One shoe on, One shoe off

Stood facing the wall

His argument with the wall

Was a philosophical one

The wall ignored him

Even worse

The wall would not look at him

To passers by it seemed unbelievable

A man talking to a wall

And the wall wouldn't talk back

A crowd gathered

For the afternoon entertainment

No one could understand

What the man wanted the wall to say

Impatience grew to anger in the man

As obscenities spouted from his mouth

And still the wall said nothing

After an hour, and the crowd grew

A woman in red said the man was crazy

An office worker uttered the man must be psycho

But all agreed he wasn't normal

To shout at a wall

Never raising your voice, always got you a retort

It wasn't until the little boy pushed

His way to the front of the crowd

That reality returned

In his high pitch voice

The boy said to the hushed crowd

The wall didn't answer

Because it didn't speak English

As the crowd dispersed

A few spoke to the solid wall

In their native tongues

But there was no reply

And the shouting man was left alone

To hollow and rant

At a wall that didn't speak

Any known language.

Tonight my love

Last night you called me a sexist

An Anti-feminist

Because I didn't say goodnight

Well tonight my love

I will show you

Who's the sexist

Don't expect me to pay for dinner

Even stand when you approach the table

I won't open the door for you

Step aside to let you go first

Tonight my love

I will treat you as my equal

I'll even call you a pig

Tonight my love,

I want you to kiss me goodnight

And I will call you names if you don't

For tonight we will start this relationship

As though we are married.

Bill And Mary

Bill And Mary

Bill and Mary were married, last Saturday.

The whole town came to see.

Now all that's left are

memories and that bottle with its

contents of confetti.

Collected by a small child,

who lives in future fantasy.

Bill and Mary may never

see that bottle or its contents of confetti,

They may, if some kind soul tells them,

hear of a small child who bottled their one and only day.

But I doubt it.

What the future holds for

Bill and Mary,

May be in that bottle

among its contents of confetti.

And yet it may have been washed down the drain.
A child can only collect so many memories.

Copyright Edward Arno 1972