In the time before the distance
there was a woman I dearly loved

Her eyes they
shined while we
stood in a moonlit alcove
making love

She told me of the
bad places she had
come from once before

She said you'll
find my nightmares
will scream from  
the dark to the dawn

She told me
not one could ever hold her
she needed to be free

She said guilt
is what you
give yourself for
doing exactly what you please

I thought about my wife
I thought about my children
I thought about my past
I thought about my future

She said
which misery do you prefer

she said
come on upstairs
I'll meet you there

We were stuck on the street
neither of us
had the key

I looked at her
She looked at me
Neither of us knew
what to believe

She wound up
with the other guy
moved me along so smoothly
I didn't even know how she did it

I ended up
stuck in Reno
in the crummy apartment
by the river
trout fishing every afternoon
my children on the phone

She sang me a nightmare
song
She showed me exactly where I  belonged

If you are out on
the avenue and you
see her there
tell her
after all these years
I probably still
care
At least when the moon and mood
are blue
and I'm thinking about
my past and future too
thinking about my fate
in the time before the distance.

Let this be an elegy
While he lies there
You know what I mean
Bury his body
Down by the side
Of a crooked highway
His spirit will soon flag
A Greyhound bus
And someday will ride
Right on out of our lives
Back to the dark tower
Where past power and fame
Will be hung like a black flag
Tattered and limp in his shame.

Some nights
the moon throws its light
like an old man
who can't hold his liquor in
and spits blood in the morning

Someone ought to kick some sense
into me, if they did I'd hum
like the body of a fiddle

I propose we all strip down
and take a swim with my friends
the dragonflies, but no one will listen
to what I have to say when I throw my voice
like an empty bottle deep in the forest

When I think of all the dark
and swift things of my rivers,
I wonder why time the old boot -
legger hides his maps and goes
on traveling the low roads

Alone I can tell you there is so much
beside the point of the thorn of the rose
and why the moon is with me always
whenever i choose to go it alone

I drink from that blue jar of time
and breathe the breath of sweet infants

Believe you me the dead shepherd
we sent up the river in a faraway land
in a time so long ago still holds us
all by the holes in his hands

You can see the dark clouds up ahead,
my cloisters I am always walking through them
with you children of the lost dreams,
and with you fifty-something snow-headed men

We have just collided with our lost sons
on the high road of morning, we are rising
dust like the dirt on our children's graves
saying nothing to our brothers the stones.

Now that I am more sober
Than those who judge us
And straighter than
Those who would lead us
My eyes see clearly
And my ears hear
The fallacies of generations

Now the age blazes
For new definitions
And more honest realities

So now it's time
To imagine the unthinkable
To forget the age-old rules
Evolved by those
Who had selfish reasons
And traditional means
To keep us in ignorance
And in our places

                                       By Phil Roberts

Beyond the rolling bones
Of memory's myths
And the ancient sounds of laughter and tears
Something mystical exists
Something deeper than marrow
The seeds of our ancestor's dreams and fears
And at a level beyond our knowing
It still rules our actions
And leads us to our fates

                                             By Phil Roberts

Not the lone glory of an orange
basking in Depression’s dusk—
its fluted bowl of purple glass

Nor the fall ways of amber
Leaves burned by roadside
curling smoke’s sun-lit sash

Not tree-lined streets
rabid leaves’ raspy voices
whirling giddy in the wind—

...in none of these

But in the moments I filled with fixing
a lamp shade
painting this place
to a stern perfection

...I thought of you
ordering the tyranny of me
the glass of me
the concrete conscience
I must be right!  Mustn’t I?

The religion of our lives
Driving through Sundays with Polkas blaring
feeding the ducks
and a roast at noon
Waffles and TV later
Lassie and You Asked For It
Wiping my mouth on a Sunday sleeve

I asked for it, alright

He came and went
to the smell of Ice Blue Aqua Velva

He came and went larger than life and first on the scene
to hurricanes, fires, muggings, and races
and of course—THE SHOP!
in an amazing array of uniforms and vehicles
Ambulances, wreckers, pickups, and police cars

He was terrifying! Wonderful!

We would love at a pained distance

His cabinet in the cellar was always locked
But now, just suppose—

if a kid were to haul on its handles...
supposedly—the sheet metal would heave and roar
with the thunder of him!

And those late nights
those harsh ****** lights
lidded hundred watt cones
in the spotlight of THERE
where I wasn’t
in the odor of oils too noxious to dare
beyond the girlish shadows—

he cleaned his guns

I waited and watched where everything seemed
to be
What...?
It seems—he just pushed her against a wall!
I step from girlhood
with my two-cents worth
and it seems I will not be Queen for a Day!

I take my vows!
I swear I will not scrape wax
from the corner of the kitchen floor with a knife!

I have waited.  I have watched
the routines of his mornings
He’s brushing his teeth; he’s combing his hair
he’s tying his shoes while he chats with the cat
I can tell you the creak of the stairs
and the sound of his footsteps rounding the house

...the routine of his return at supper
the routine of anger
My routine of being late—
and as good as dead
squeezing behind—
HIS CHAIR
Praying he wouldn’t notice the mud
Praying for the epiphany of his good mood
when the TV and me--

wouldn’t be blamed for the downfall of the nation

When I was a younger man
Time moved so much quicker
There was always something happening
Always something changing
Somewhere to go
Something to catch up with
Or even to escape from
People came and went
Then came and went again
"Where's he living these days?"
"Who knows what's happening?"

Now things are quieter and calmer
In this age of ghosts
In the land of the lost and lonely
Where once there was speed
There's nowhere to go
And nothing much changes
Even my dreams remain the same
As, with an unaccustomed patience
I write poems
And wait

                              By Phil Roberts

come crashing down
through darkness
into sight
a permanent marker
sharpie stuck in your eye
black all you see
negatives hung on the walls
charcoal reliefs
of those you knew
paragraphs of sadness
posted to your wall in pencil
on sheets of paper

ashtrays filled with ashes
trash cans with beer cans
and the day begins
thinking of when it will end
making breath and striving
just to make it
until
you see the moon beckons again

Shiny bricks and skeins of yellow grass
Barely perceptible colours
Hung with liquid haze
Dog **** and thunder
Heavy close and thick
Miasma
Clings to sweat
Running with drizzle
Clings to damp
Drowning the pores of the skin
Making collars clinging sticky
Rubbing and abrasive

In view of the towering flats
The greyly awaiting wait
Standing at the bus stop
Speaking quiet weather talk
In the distantly English way
So safely meaningless
This polite evasion
Ignores their damp dilemma
Soon, as they sit inside the bus
These bodies shall steam
Like cattle in a byre

Kids hang around the shops
Emptying and kicking cans
The younger ones
Run and shout manically
Their elders spit
And swear casually
All hoods and shadows
Asking adults to buy them lager
Because they can't get served at the "offie"
Rain changes nothing here

A bedroom guitar plays
Weakly electric
And the Turneresque sky
Swallows the sound whole and flat
Sophisticated trash
Crying into a cloudy breast
Shaded darkly round
Full and swollen
Grey and sodden
The distant rumbling
Tumbling closer to home

                                    By Phil Roberts