Poems by Bob Boyd

Amy Robsart married Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester,
A loveless marriage, the earl wanted Queen Elizabeth I,
And Queen Elizabeth fell in love with him.

Amy heard a rumor she was going to be poisoned to death
To get her out of the way so the Earl could be with the queen.
Amy died from a suspicious fall down a flight of stairs;
Some believed she was pushed. Preachers proclaimed foul play.

A ghost began haunting Kenilworth Castle where Amy lived,
Thought to be Amy from dying a shocking death.
Supposedly she appeared before Robert Dudley
And told her husband, “Soon you’ll be joining me.”
Dudley died a few days later.

Oh Amy were you really a ghost
Or were the apparitions just
Low frequency sounds causing
Strange feelings and fake visions?

Whatever the cause, ghost or sounds,
tragic you died under suspicious
Circumstances and didn’t have a full life.

Bob Boyd

Good girl, honor roll in high school
Nice, caring, friendly and well liked
Went to church, remained a virgin
Her hard work in high school
Earned her a scholarship
With the University of Vermont
First year, studied hard day and night
Wasn’t there to party
Focused on good grades
And becoming a social worker
In her Sophomore year met a senior
Didn’t know he was a playboy
Who’d slept with many women
And bragged about his conquests
After many dates and persuasions
Took her virginity and moved on
Gave the young college girl AIDS
Does that seem fair to you?
And this poem isn’t fiction.

Bob Boyd

A Young College Girl

Good girl, honor roll in high school
Nice, caring, friendly and well liked
Went to church, remained a virgin
Her hard work in high school
Earned her a scholarship
With the University of Vermont
First year, studied hard there
Wasn’t there to party
Focused on good grades
And becoming a social worker
In her Sophomore year met a senior
Didn’t know he was a playboy
Who’d slept with many women
Bragged about all his conquests
After many dates and persuasions
Took her virginity and moved on
Gave the young college girl AIDS
Does that seem fair to you?

Bob Boyd

One became a PhD
The other an MD
The third never
Amounted to anything
According to her critical mother
An underachiever
A ne’er do well
Never went to college
Lacked the expected ambition
Required of the three sisters
In their high achievers family
Father a prominent lawyer
Mother a distinguished professor
Sister number three just
Worked selling ladies shoes
In an upscale retail store
When the mother and father
Got old and became seriously ill
One and two, too busy with their careers
Number three was there for her parents
Their Caregiver twenty four hours a day
Until they both came to their final ends

Bob Boyd

Dark clouds mass
Fauna feel it
Run for cover
A conflagration
Coming
Flora sense it
Petals close
Flowers fade
Baba Vanda
Predicted it
Too late
Humans saw it
World in flames
Many dead
Hopes and
Dreams gone
If only
Christ had
Come again….

Bob Boyd

When a kid in the fifties had to bury a family cat,
Buried in the woods. The burial felt eerie to me.

Late that night cats meowing at our front door,
Seemed a paranormal frightening thing.

Somehow the cats must have known
Their friend, our family cat, had died.

And like people crying at a funeral,
They were mourning their dead friend

With a group funeral dirge that
Sounded like something from Hell.

Thank God they didn’t dig up the cat
And drop her at our front door.

I felt bad enough losing our beloved pet
And hated having to bury her.

Bob Boyd

Going way back to the twenties on YouTube
Seeing people dancing back then, young and merry,
All dead, their dancing done, all in the ground,
A sobering reminder of life’s transience.
Not always easy to really get the grim fate
Awaiting you and me when our dancing is done.
Living like we’re here forever, even though we know better.
Sad how many leave the dance younger than age thirty three.
Often wonder why many so young have to die, never living full lives;
Sometimes I say things like maybe they were needed in heaven sooner,
Or perhaps God needed more angels in heaven.
But those words are insufficient to answer the ultimate: Why?
And the seeming injustice of it all. God’s call.

Bob Boyd

DeLorenzo made a big mistake in the city I’m from,
Key witness to murders in the east of the city.
Thought he was a fearless gangster but kind of a punk,
Refused police protection too tough for that
Could take care of himself, no problem.
The killers ain’t gonna do anything to me
They can go straight to Hell.
Shortly after that, Delorenzo disappeared.
Suspicions pointed to the East Side Gang.
Everybody in the pool hall I hung out in knew that;
The word was prominent on the street.
No clues needed. Obvious. Open and shut.
He should never have messed with East Side
Or chosen to rat them out to the police.
All that eventually turned up of Delorenzo
Was one of his arms in the local dump.
No witness, no DNA, the killers went free.
One knocked him out. Another held him down.
A third ran over him with a car relentlessly
Until he was stone cold dead.

Bob Boyd

The Pavement’s sizzling sitting in the merciless sun,
Got no money, no job, no friends, no wife, no life.
Used to be a high flying CEO, had the monied, extravagant life
Blew it all beginning with white lines on my plush desk
In my executive suite. Lost it all, even a beautiful, faithful wife,
That looked kind of like a famous social worker, Madonna Moss.
Now I shuffle in the sad streets screwed up and bumming money
For more drugs and the never lasting euphoric high, reduced to that.
Diving in dumpsters behind fast food restaurants for garbage food.
The homeless shelter doctor says I haven’t long to live, a year at best,
Doesn’t matter to me, my life sucks; it’s over anyway. I’m done.
Tomorrow I might jump off a bridge or walk in front of a freight train
And take my chances, heaven or hell if either exists, don’t care where.
If I can get a gun, I’ll put it to my head, pull the trigger and call it a day.

Bob Boyd

Packaging shrinking, prices going up.
Cashers being replaced by self service machines.
Robots coming to replace grocery store workers.
Meet your local grocery store manager, Mr. AI.
More food alleged to give us cancer
No matter which ones we eat.
Maybe the cause of younger people getting cancer,
Hidden in the food, a head of lettuce a death sentence,
Peas and carrots in a can, seeds of future cancers.
I write this sitting here eating junk food copiously,
Playing Russian Roulette with my health, supposedly.
I’m 79, had cancer, and it doesn’t matter to me.

Bob Boyd

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Free verse poems

Amy, Lady Dudley (nee Robsart 7 June 1532 – 8 September 1560)

A Young College Girl’s Demise

A Young College Girl

Three Sisters

Annihilation

Feline Dirge at the Door

Watching Dead People Dance

DeLorenzo

Calling It a Day

Robots and Cancer at the Grocery Store