I Cannot See My Old Friends...

Someone wanted me to write a poem that is taken from

some poem that is one I really like so I wrote this one. 

It was inspired by, "I Cannot Sing the Old Songs,"
by Charlotte Arlington Barnard.


I Cannot See My Old Friends...

I cannot see my old friends
I knew long years ago.
Or hear their gentle voices;
Those days are gone, I know.
The mem'ries that now fill my heart
Bring happiness and pain.
I cannot see my old friends
Or feel their touch again.

I cannot see my old friends;
The friends who were so true;
Who shared the times, both good and bad,
That all of us went through..
We played our games and lived our lives;
We never failed to care,-
And if I tripped and fell, I knew
My friends would be right there.

I cannot see my old friends;
The teardrops sometimes start
When I recall the memories
They left here in my heart.
Perhaps when earthly bonds have loosed
And set my spirit free;
I'll once more see my old friends
For all eternity.

finis...

Promise Me You'll Always Be My Friend...

Here is another poem. I wrote this one only a couple of months ago. I hope you enjoy it.


I cannot stay beside you,- on such a night as this.
A night when every star is in your eyes,
And beckons me to lie with you, and this I cannot do,
Although my heart does soar up to the skies.

Your blood red lips entice me; they softly call my name
And whisper words of love into my ear,-
But I can find no reason; none that is good enough,
That I forsake the one my heart holds dear.

For we were once two precious friends, (that now seems far away)
And walked together; warm then was your touch
But only then as a true friend, your countenance was fair;
I loved you then enough, but not too much.

I came upon a sight one day, of you and someone else
And when I looked at her my heart was fast.
You told me this girl was your friend; would be forever more!
I knew then I had found my love at last.

You followed close behind us as we two walked down the aisle
And bound our souls together with a vow,
And you were always there with us when'er we needed you.
If love came hard for us, you showed us how.

Then came the time when all was not the same as once it was.
I saw a change come over my sweet girl;
I watched her now and saw her loving eyes begin to dim.
The time had come when she would leave this world.

I just could not admit it,-I'd lose the one I love.
But you were there to help me through the pain.
I wept tears though I tried not to; I couldn't hold them back;
You told me then our loss was Heavens gain.

So now there's just the two of us where three of us had been;
A year has passed since we said our goodbyes
And you could be my lover now instead of just a friend;
You feel that now,-I see it in your eyes.

But I know now that I can never really let her go;
Her love and mem'ry I have locked within.
Please say I'm wrong in thinking that you want to take her place;
But promise me you'll always be my friend.

finis...

It's Really Hard To Say a Last Goodbye,-

I have a bunch of poems and songs and I wonder if they will ever get read, at least in my lifetime, so I decided to post a new poem or song every week (maybe more often) until they run out. With some of them I may put a link to an MP3 or You Tube Video of that poem or song. I hope some of you folks will find at least one you like. 

This is the first one.    JC aka Ca...

It's really hard to say a last goodbye,-
To know you'll never see someone again,-
To see the look of loss and know that this
Will be the last time that you'll see your friend.
You gently come to her and take her hand,-
You don't know what it is you're gonna say,-
You'd rather not say anything at all;
You never thought you two would part this way.

You feel a little lump start in your throat
And get a little quiver in your chin.
It's hard for you to look right in her eyes
And know you'll never look in them again.
Her soft brown eyes are asking you to speak
But that is not an easy thing to do.
What can you say that will make any sense
When you now know your friend is leaving you.

You've been together all these happy years
And never thought this love could ever end;
You never thought the Angels would appear
And with your love to Heaven would ascend.
But now her loving eyes begin to close;
You whisper that you love her and you cry.
You kiss her gently, then she goes away;
It's really hard to say a last goodbye.

finis...

We Never Got Sick or Injured...I Wasn't Worth It...

Our daughter,Tracey, called a few minutes ago and wanted to know how to find something on the internet. I, of course, gave her the standard answer: ‘Type it into google.’ That always works for me.

Googling things is a lot like staying well was when I was a kid. Now when you need to know something, you call on Google. When I was a kid, to stay well, my sisters and brother and I, under the strict supervision of our Mother, took “Calatabs” and “Black Draught" and kerosene and sugar for colds and used Merthiolate for skinned places, large gashes, small gashes and anything else that bled.

The calatab was a small, round slick pill. (No one ever knew what was in it) It shouldn’t have been hard to swallow but it was. When you tried to gulp it down, it went as far as the top of your throat and stayed there all day. I’ve eaten as much as a whole loaf of Kilpatricks bread trying to get the calatab to go down but it never worked. I think it eventually just melted away. It was the first in history, 'time release pill.'

The Black Draught was worse. It was in a flaky, grainy but very fine powder form and to do any good, it had to be taken into the mouth dry and washed down with a glass of water. I remember how hard it was to get all of the powder down. Sometimes it took up to three glasses of water to get it all down. It was bad enough to gag a maggot! I think I was only sick once or twice during my entire childhood.

Us kids learned at an early age to not catch colds. The best medicine for colds was sugar mixed in with a little kerosene. I remember wondering if I would blow up if I took that 'medicine' while I was standing too near the stove. And, if I snuck around and smoked,i made sure it wasn't while using the outhouse after taking Moms 'cold medicine.'

I never took cuts or abrasions home either. I did for a while when I was very young, until I realized merthiolate burned much worse than the skint place hurt.

Merthiolate was a red medicine in a little bitty brownish/reddish bottle. It had a cap that screwed onto the top and attached to the underside of the cap was a glass applicator than went down into that bottle of liquid fire. I’m sure the reason Merthiolate was in such a small bottle was, if there was too much in a bigger bottle, it would break out into flames and burn up. It was that hot!

Once, when I was swimming in the river down at the pipe, I cut my right knee to the bone on a broken beer bottle. I climbed out of the river and found a wad of paper and held it on my knee to try to stop the bleeding until I could get home which was a half mile away. It still bled pretty good and, just as I came in sight of my house, I remembered the Merthiolate and immediately turned around to go back to the river and tough it out. (as tough as you can be at age ten)

Too late! My mother saw me and started yelling for me to 'come here, right now!' I was caught. I reluctantly went on to the house and showed Mom my slashed knee. She said, "James Cameron, what have you done?" I didn't answer because I knew it was pretty obvious what I had done. Somehow I felt guilty for having had an accident; I should have been more careful and inspected the entire river bed before going into the water.

Anyhow, Mother got a clean dish towel and tore a strip off of it then got the Merthiolate. I told her it was much better now and would probably be all right, but you know Mothers, they think they know better about everything. Mom said, "James Cameron, now, I know better than that," and she sat me down in the front yard on a peach crate and cleaned the gash and, no matter how much I whimpered, applied the Merthiolate liberally. I know the neighbors are still wondering what the ensuing loud scream was about; maybe a mountain lion had wandered into the neighborhood and was calling his mate.

It burned like fire and Mother comforted me as she always did with, "James Cameron, now you shut that up or I'll give you something to yell about!" Well, I figured I had enough to yell about already so I shut up and quietly waited for the fire to go out.
Mom opined as to how maybe now I would think twice about going back to that river and maybe catching polio. She was right; I did think twice,-once on the peach crate and once on the way back to the river.

There was another medicine a lot like merthiolate. It was called, “Mercurochrome.” I asked my Mother once why we didn’t use that one and she said it wouldn’t do any good because it didn’t burn! Go figure! It made sense to her.

Later......

A Fun Day Today...

Today will be a fun day. My niece is here from Arkansas where her husband, Tom,  is stationed in the military and Mi Espousa (a little Mex lingo here) Donna and I are going to a get-together with her and more of the family. It will be held at her husbands' parents house.

  

Her name is Mary Lynne and the first thing she said on the phone was, "Uncle James,-you and Aunt Donna have to come to our barbecue," and the second thing was, "And bring your guitar!"

And I, being the outgoing and gregarious person that I am, will be more than happy to comply!

I suggested to Mi Espousa (a bit more Mex lingo here) that we take our laptop PC and entertain the folks but she poo-pooed that suggestion. I will, howsomever, take said PC anyhow, just in case she changes her mind.

Anyhow, it should be a toot. I'll let you know later.  Have a good one!

Later...

'Duh...'

A little known fact:

The first testicular guard "Cup" was used in Hockey in 1874 and the first helmet was used in 1974.

It took 100 years for men to realize that the brain is also important.

Later...