On the Closing of the Harvard Road Bridge I can't get there from here anymore. The bridge is out. It closed this week. It's a weak old structure, tired and worn; Broken supports, a cracked lane, a sagging deck about to give way. This was our bridge for a long old time; lots of water gone under. At times a raging torrent, sometimes only a trickle, but each season flowed with its own beauty. You left, moved away, took the kids and went to live on the other side. And now, the bridge is closed. I can see you over there, so close it seems, but I can't reach you, can't get near enough to talk to you. My shouts of "I love you" are lost in the air, never reaching your ears. The bridge should have lasted our lifetime, but now it speaks of neglected maintenance, forgone repairs. Who would have thought a structure of concrete and steel would decay? The bridge sits quietly now, unused, dying a natural death. And I'm left behind, stranded here in our past. Someday a new bridge will cross this river. Someone will help build it, bigger and stronger than before. It'll cross this same river but to a different place. And though I'll still see you over on the other side, I know I can never get there from here again. Cecil Williams 7/17/92 ************************* Dead Red Rose O your love was like the red red rose That wilts and soon expires, Now your love is like the funeral dirge That plays oe'r dead men's pyres Though fair you are, my future Ex, You're out of love for me, And though I love you still, my dear, My heart must set you free. My heart must set you free, my dear, And my tears could fill the sea, Because I love you still, my dear, But your love is not for me. So fare thee well, my only love, Our life paths now must part, And you shall come no more, my love, Oh, broken, is my heart. (With Apologies to Robert Burns) Cecil Williams Thanksgiving Day, 1991 ***************************************** The Wind Cries Marie After all the jacks are in their boxes and the clowns have all gone to bed You can hear old happiness staggering down the street with footsteps dressed in red And the wind whispers "Marie..." A broom is drearily sweeping up the broken pieces of yesterday's life Somewhere a queen is weeping Somewhere a king has no wife And the wind, it cries "Marie..." The traffic lights, they've turned all red and shine their emptiness down on my sleep The tiny island drifts down stream 'cause the life it lived, is dead And the wind screams "Marie..." Will the wind ever remember the names it's blown in the past? And with this crutch, its old age, and its wisdom it whispers no, this will be the last And the wind cries "Marie..." Cecil Williams 1993(?) (Altered from "The Wind Cries Mary" by Jimi Hendrix) **************************************************** Horizon A far-off ship sails away over the horizon. Now just a speck, it will soon disappear. Flying the pirate's flag of skull and cross-bones, it bears a treasure chest containing all I once loved, and all I once was; It's crewed by four children who share my last name, and steered by a woman with a wooden heart. Cecil Williams 8/04/93 ************************ The feel of old leather the look of soiled white lace the smell of old shoes favorites no longer worn but not quite ready for the trash familiar old shirts and pants still hanging at the ready once faithful work clothes now no longer needed a tired old watch useless and silent stored in a junk box amid old smiling photos and saved birthday cards with ancient words of love We went a million miles together in fourteen years, You and I before the wind changed directions and the grass grew tall between us You weren't there to see but did you know your lawyer laughed at my tears as I signed the final papers? Cecil Williams 9/6/96 *********************** ( "Gone" is the very first poem I ever wrote... ) Gone it's 14 years, our marriage, our love we've built our home together the myth says love grows with time but you say, love has gone away, and you must follow it so you are gone it was 14 years, our marriage, our love tonight, loneliness and sadness are the newlyweds Cecil Williams 9/17/91 ******************************* I'm sitting here crying again I should be over you after all you're all over me Cecil Williams 10/13/91 **************************** Tears Tears welling up in my eyes. not now, it's worktime, daytime, it's not the right time, to cry. this gnawing ache in my chest so this is heartache, firsthand. you're home, packing our life in boxes, and tomorrow, we'll both start a new life, apart. You, and the kids, in your house, and me, alone, in ours. Cecil Williams 10/01/91 ************************** 3AM Husband and Wife, together lying, restless motion, touching legs entwined, then not back to back, then not sleeping lightly, then not stomach noises, house noises, night noises, 0.3.0.0. silently screaming digital red, reminder, counting down to infinity Cecil Williams - 09/20/91 *************************** I knew it would come, you told me months before. But still there's a certain powerful feeling of shock, unexpressable dismay and numbness at coming home from work, and finding you gone. You left no note, no message, gave no warning that that was the day, that the past night was the last night we would ever be together. Honey, after thirteen years of "I love you" why was there no goodbye? The house and I went dead, without you and the kids. My life suddenly devoid of purpose. No longer a husband, reduced to an absent father, the only direction left for me, down. It's been twelve long lonely months now, and I still cringe in pain and choke on emotion when I remember the feeling of walking in and seeing you gone. Cecil Williams 9/17/92 ************************ Refund I want my money back, please I want a refund on this life It just isn't working out it isn't quite what I had in mind I want to try a different planet, a new galaxy a body strange from here and oh, by the way how much extra will it cost to be loved? Cecil Williams 9-23-91 ******************************* Fortune Teller O fortune teller, tell me from the palm upon my hand; what's the story of my life to be, what is the master plan? Will I keep a wife and children, will I rich and famous be, or do the sands of time soon end their silent flow for me? Cecil Williams 9-24-91 ******************************* Teddy Bear Fuzzy white teddy bear, there in my bed, you're hugging my wife, I wish you were dead. She no longer loves me, she said, it is true, so tell me, white teddy, why does she love you? I'm taller, and stronger, and braver than you, I bring home a paycheck; sometimes even two. I gave her four children, three girls and a boy, now she's trading me in, for a fuzzy white toy. I gave her my love, 14 years, tried and true, now she's throwing me out, for the likeness of you. So, fuzzy white teddy bear, there in my bed, you're hugging my wife, I wish you were dead. And I'm setting out here, at a quarter past two, making love to a beer, and this poem 'bout you. Cecil Williams 9/29/91 *************************** dizzyness in my head from the beer in the fridge where your cottage cheese sits putrifying because you didn't take it when you picked up your mail that still comes here even though you don't. Cecil Williams 10/16/91 ************************* (Anne M OConnor) writes: > > The Affair > > Two cars collide > no real damage > a few dents > some paint scratched > They stop > examine injuries > exchange names > -drive on- > losing each other > in the night To which I replied: "The Affair" Two cars collide one badly damaged driver's side smashed A passenger gets out dragging the children gets in the other car and drives off with the man leaving behind her bleeding husband. No ambulance is called no help is sent the death is slow in coming and relatives notified immediately don't have time to come round to view the wreckage or the body of a sibling son; "There's grass to mow, and laundry to wash, you know..." Cecil 16/Aug/93 **************** To Marie Before I sign these papers, I have a request for you, If you ever again see the girl I married, please tell her I still love her very much, and I miss her, oh god how I miss her. She was beautiful, caring, and she loved me. But now she's gone and it's been a cold long time since she left last year, and you came to live in her place, and I don't know you, and you don't love me, and these papers are from your lawyer, to prove that you don't love me, and I must sign them, but before I do, please, promise me? that if you ever see Marie, The sweet, loving, beautiful Marie that I know, mother of my children, and owner of my heart, won't you please tell her that I love her very much? Oh god how I miss her so. Cecil Williams 6/17/92 ********************** Morning Red modem lights flicker in the darkness of my living room. Public TV talking quietly, provides room ambiance, backed up by the soft whirring noise from the computer fan. Vivid blue computer light from the screen reflects on brown glass of a nearby beer bottle. It is night again, and my family is gathered round: Computer, TV, Dog, and Brew. We are close companions in the dark, huddled in this room conversing, exchanging ideas; Winter approaches, Sheba(dog) reminds us. "Time to start growing that longer fur." Sony(TV) is harping about volcanoes and earthquakes. "Three quarters of them are around the Pacific Rim". Bud(Beer bottle) is silent and glassy eye'ed now, his contents slowly sipped away over the past hour. He and I spend a lot of time staring into the virtual space of computer's screen, poking around, looking into the minds of people docked at terminals everywhere. It's sorta like a combination flea market and eclectic bookstore in there, and we occasionally find a trinket or treasure to dust off and bring home. Look! Only 5 more hours till sunrise! I think winter will be longer and colder this year. Cecil Williams 10/2/92 *************************** My good christian wife now lives in good christian adultery with her good christian boyfriend and our four good christian children. Seems she ran out of good christian love for me. Cecil Williams ************** I love you I lote you I late you I hate you I have you I hove you I love you I lote you I late you I hate you I have you I hove you Cecil Williams - 8/92 *********************** 1 Come dance with my shadow and twirl fast around as I hide from your memory and run from the sound of your voice as you sing 2 and I don't want to hear Our love is long gone the sad song of a memory but from your heart not mine that's no longer there. I still cry out in pain cause you've been so unkind 3 to the one who long loved you I still dance every night and thought you divine in what once was a home as we danced in the shadows to the music of memories of sun, moon and time. in shadows alone in the darkness I twirl 4 and then raise up a glass I remember the girl in a toast to the memory who danced soft down the aisle of love in the past. then we both said "I do" and we kissed with a smile 5 and our hearts danced together As the winds of time shifted till "death do us part" and another tune played but the ultimate death she danced with a stranger was the love in her heart. and then with him layed and the soft-hearted woman 6 who said "I love you" Off into the sunset was replaced by a witch she went with the man from the devil's own pew. took all of our children along by the hand now I dance in this 7 fine empty shell of a home And I dance with a shadow with my grief and despair that nightly comes round and my thoughts all alone. he's the friendly grim reaper he makes not a sound but with him I find promise of peace to be found when he takes me away, puts me deep in the ground. 8 So come dance with my shadow and twirl fast around as I hide from your memory, I'm gone from the sound of your voice as you sing and I don't have to hear the sad song of a memory that's no longer there. Cecil Williams 5/14/93 ************************ Traitor Radio You left me for Playing softly another's love in the late evening, that's OK, it's the Saturday night I don't need you request line. Not desperate, I was tired of my lady... don't need your love. nothing heals a broken heart like... I'll find someone new somewhere, out there... You betrayed the promise we've only just begun... till death do us part. If I could save time in a bottle... till part do us death? turn around, every now and then i get... a little bit lonely this is for all the lonely people... I wonder if you're home when a man loves a woman... Oh, my love, my darling, I'll call and see I've hungered for your touch, I wonder if you'll talk a long lonely time, I miss you so much i need your love will you come back i need your love... and spend the Saturday night request line evening with me sharing memories... or maybe the rest of your life? Cecil Williams 10/27/91 ************************* Someone named Owl writes: >Mother, why is the water brown > why is daddy gone >Mother, why do the flower die > why do I always cry >Daddy, why have you run away > are you ever coming home to stay >Daddy, Mother cried in bed tonight > Are you doing alright and I reply: Daughters, I'm home in our house where we all use to laugh and play Daughters, It's grown so cold in here since you all left on that day Wife, is he good to my kids do they call him daddy Wife, what am I in your new world do I still have a name Life, how can it be, that a man can steal another man's wife Life, it's cruel, you see I had a family, now, just a memory... the water turned brown the flowers die and I want to run away and hide my tears Cecil Williams ************** Do you know I love You? I "don't care". Voyage to hell begins. Other hearts she chases now. Revision of my life's dream is forced. Children drift away from their father. End of love is a soul tragedy Don't love you anymore, she said. I want a divorce, she said. Voyage to hell begins. Other hearts she already chased. Revision of life dream is forced. Children drift away from dad. End of family is the end of life. Life is a play in three acts Before love during love after love DogII I'm just a dog crossing the hiway of love and you're a bus. Cecil Williams 10/16/91 ************************ DogIII Now I'm the bus driver and you're a dog on the hiway of our past. Cecil Williams 4/22/97 *********************** It hurts to be a father. mothers are loved fathers are invisible they often are pretended not to exist, and they don't count. except on payday. but mothers have found that it isn't even necessary to live with the fathers, the courts will take his paycheck and mail it directly to the mothers. it isn't even necessary to love the fathers at all. they don't matter a bit, not even on payday, when they used to matter just a little bit for 5 about minutes. Cecil Williams ************** The sound of one foot stepping, shuffling the dark of night The sound of one eye blinking, fluttering the sparkle of a tear The sound of hair growing, lengthening and lingering before it falls The sound of one hand waving, frantically before the closing of the water The sound of a life drowning in the silence she left behind Cecil Williams 3/19/93 ************************ I opened the dictionary today to the exact page for my word. The very page on first opening, in a big book with pages thin as onion skin and 1561 of them numbered. Page 562. "HELL", "a nether world in which the dead continue to exist". Hell is also another way to spell love after the passage of time. Cecil Williams - 11/9/92 ************************** >Tom Wachtel writes: > > do you own your own house? > do you live in it alone? > is it like you dreamed it would be? > is it home? > there's no time... > it's this fine moment, make a choice > for choosing's doing must be done in cold alone > making maybe moments stay and spend a while > this gem, this plain bright stone > Cecil Replies: Yes, I own that home o'er there, It's got 4 bedrooms, 3 are spare. And as I putter round alone, there's too much time. And I wonder, is this hell or is this home? A hermit's life is not for me, I'd rather have a family. A wife and kids, the joy they'd bring, just like the blooming of the spring. And for me that is enough. Cecil Williams - 9/29/92 ************************** Jagged shrapnel exploded metal smoking shards flying pieces capable of decapitation... Your words, "I don't love you anymore" Log-truck precariously loaded speeding through a curve logs fall off come through the windshield... Your words, "I want a divorce" Car stalls train tracks freight train ten feet away closing at 80 mph... Engineer sees in my eyes the fear of losing you. Marie, I loved you and I've died for you a thousand deaths. Cecil Williams - 10/7/92 ************************** Insanity, profanity, and deamons from within, terrorize my heart and soul, destroying me again. I thought that I'd outgrown you long since, left you in the past, you tried to kill me many times, but I could read between the lines, and sidestepped many dangerous minds, sometimes evoked by fancy wines, but mostly just by darkness. And loneliness. Then came a wife into my life and fourteen years passed without strife. She chased you all the hell away, or kept you far and long at bay, That is until the month of May of this regretful year I say. But now, S-O decides to go and make her merry solo way, upon life's path she spins her wheels, and throwing rocks and dust, she deals a nasty blow upon my soul, a fatal crash upon my heart, and leaves me wondering what's the part, she didn't like, why did she leave, me crying here inside the dark ness of my mind's black emptiness. my heart riptorn, my soul escapes, and life but two dimension takes; Null & Void. Cecil Williams 11/19/91 ************************* KIDS tricycles on the sidewalk, and frisbees on the lawn; I used to have four children, but with their mom, they've gone. I miss my four kids night and day; my heart bleeds tears, my life is grey. I'd give my soul to hear them say: "daddy, we're coming back home..." "to stay." Cecil Williams 7/7/93 ************************ Love is like a nosebleed Some suffer it once or twice a lifetime others far more often Love is like that pain you feel in the middle of the night upon awakening to a full bladder and you lie there for eternity fighting it, but knowing well you must eventually submit Love is like the flu afflicting mind body and spirit synergistically Love becomes an old car rusty with no brakes smoking dirty and never washed but expensive to replace Love grows like an ugly weed feeding on need and want the cow pies of life Love grows too familiar to notice over time ********** Unsigned - did I write this? Cecil... I loved you as much as I could, more than I was taught. But my love was finite, incomplete. My heart could not stand to love you less than fully, and so by sheer inner strength, I filled in the gap with a make believe love. And my love for you became complete in my mind. You said you loved me, said it often, said it with gifts, said it with hugs. You always went along with whatever I wanted. You thought if you kept saying you loved me, your own finite, incomplete love would grow and become whole. But in the end, you said you didn't love me. Your love died along the way. You hadn't loved me for a long time. Cecil Williams ************** PHONE The phone rings and it's You who left me last year. Then, I begged you, pleaded with you not to go. I would have done anything at all to keep you, make you happy. But you left anyway; took the kids, and moved in with Him. It's been a year and I'm still trying to learn how to hate you; Homewrecker! Adulterous hypocritical christian! But now the phone rings, and it's you, babbling about what you're doing tonight, and what time will I pick up the kids, and I don't know what else you said, cause I don't hear your words. Your voice, a sweet siren's sound, smoother than mother's milk, softer than baby's breath, silky and inviting, pours in my ear, and goes straight for my heart. Once again the old feelings come back. I love you, want you, need you. And I miss you so. Without you I am nothing but a cast away sailor, clinging to a plank as the ocean slowly digests my flesh day after day. Cecil Williams 8/27/92 ************************* New love is like robust red blood fresh and flowing as life through veins sustaining night and day revealing beauty in all things Dead love is like a scab dried blood on wounds stuck to skin and hair painful to remove it is an ugly side of life. Cecil Williams 10/08/92 *********************** My smile disappeared last year, vanished without a trace in the night. In it's place a scowl now hangs around upon my face. It seems when love kicks you in the chin and breaks your heart, it also steals your grin. I feel so seriously somber now, and really miss that smile! Can anybody help me find a smile that fits my face, and turn the light back on inside this dark and dreary place? My broken heart is stronger, now wiser, more mature. So time, please bring back my smile to be the final cure. Cecil Williams - Riyadh, Saudi Arabia - 10/18/92 **************************************************** WATER_RUN Water running past the bridge spring time high rush I wonder if all the water in the world will run beneath this concrete span in time I wonder if all the love in the world would have stayed you from leaving in time Cecil Williams 6/11/93 **************************** I tried to go back, to my past, to an old job; but 14 years of memories chased me out of the building. And even their offer of more money wasn't enough to chase away the haunting ghosts of an ex-wife and four children, playing games in the shadows with another man. Cecil Williams 2/25/96 *********************** kdgreg@som-uky.campus.mci.net wrote... > >Dirty Job >---------- >I vacuum on Sundays >after the children leave. >It's not that I'm so tidy >but the roaring sometimes drowns out >thoughts that otherwise might >sneak inside my head >and I'm tired of being angry. >Their ridiculous father >with his smug satisfaction >at besting me in court-- >he could always beat me at games-- >Whoosh! There he goes, >a cookie crumb sucked up inside >with dust and miniscule insects, >right where he belongs, among filth. >I have the most immaculate floors. >------------ >(Okay, so I lied about no more divorce poems. But give me credit, >I'm not whining.) Cecil Replies: I've been known to shoot carp on Sundays with my bow and arrow; big ulgy slimy carp, toothless, and with bulging eyes. I drag them from the water, impaled, bleeding, flopping, with the fear of death in their eyes. I cut them open, rip out their guts with my bare hands, and toss them into the weeds for the coyotes. And every carp I shoot has a name; the same name, a name shared with the man who now sleeps with my wife and three daughters... Cezil de Tristeza (Cecil Williams) - 6/4/96 ********************************************* An Old Carp It's a beautiful sunny late summer day and I drive to the Dunes and go kayaking down that remote stretch of river. Bow and arrow strapped to the deck, I know a good spot to shoot carp for fun. My arrows rip through their slimy bodies then my hunting knife, so sharp, cuts open their soft bellies and my hand rips out their guts. I toss them into the bushes to feed the maggots and coyotes and smile to myself, thinking; "take that, Jerry Scott!" Cecil Williams - 28 Aug 95 ****************************