Poems by Larry Tilander

Held Life | The Executioner | In the Morning | Anybody | Double Take | Astray | Sometimes | Cocaine Katy | Ivan's Map | Depression |

Held Life



Jennifer, Jenny, she's gone, I won't cry

She never could tolerate tears in my my eye

Besides, I've her treasures to hold to my breast

To count in the evenings as I go to rest

Her laughter in birdsong that floats on the air

The dandelion floats are her wind blown hair

The breezes, caresses she sends from the skies

Reflections, all sparkles from her loving eyes

Her words are kept safely away in my head

You don't understand, my love cannot be dead





The Executioner



I see your stare of terror as your gaze rests on my cowl

Beneath this mask, you wonder, do I smile or do I scowl

You're thinking I'm a sadist, by the stench of fear amused

Or maybe a fanatic who won't see a rule abused



You might think I'm a moron with no thoughts to call my own

Or a puppy pinching bully who is grossly ovrgrown

But I tell you now in truthfulness I neither smile, nor frown

I just do my work in boredom, it's the best paid job in town





In the Morning



Most mornings 'fore this porcelain god I kneel down to pray

For help to somehow make it through another drinking day

My mouth is dry, my ankle hurts, my head is full of pain

And deep inside I know I lie when I say not again



I kneel in silence as the world goes somehow spinning free

That awful face that's staring back, oh God it can't be me

And now here come those wretched sounds to break the morning's hush

Then finished with my morning prayer, I rise, and god I flush





Anybody



Does anybody care if a maple dies

Does anybody listen to starving cries

Does anybody look with their own two eyes

Please tell me I'm not alone



Does anybody know why they're fighting a war

Does anybody plead for the voiceless poor

Does anybody know what their government's for

Please tell me I'm not alone



Does anybody see how the rivers run black

Does anybody fear the atomic attack

Does anybody want to see love come back

Please tell me I'm not alone





Double Take



Surrounded by good we can't see we are weakened by hurt and quit trying

A little slip now and we fall, start thinking that life is for lying

A happy face smiles at my call, a hug at the door and I run

A honey bee buzzes my ear, now blinded I look at the sun



Again close my eyes to the light, just shove me back into my cell

Your silence construed as a lie, so just let me lay in my Hell

A rock and an island are cool, or that's what my speakers have sung me

A happy face spit in my eye, a honey bee buzzed lies, and stung me





Astray



A flower alone, unattended, the product of some scattered seed

An orchid astray, unbefriended, so silently crying in need

Choked out by the vines and the brambles of ignorance, false love, and fear

Shut out from the light by the shambles of towering hatreds so near

Crushed down in the path of progression by the ongoing wheels of fate

Your body your only possession, may the rain of true love be not late

To strengthen the stalk of your greatness and nurture your soul to it's flower

To root you in happy surroundings, to bloom for the world in your hour





Sometimes



Sometimes a wayward flower grows between stones on the trail

As pretty as it's promise is, we know it has to fail

Sometimes a pup is ugly so, we say, "It's cute." and smile

Sometimes a special child is born to stay just for a while

Sometimes an angel visits us, a sprite that cannot stay

Enjoy the flower, love the pup, and help the child to play

Then when you lay you down to rest and no more will you roam

The flower, child, pup, and angel, will welcome you home





Cocaine Katy



Cocaine Katy wasn't a lady, she wasn't even no friend of mine

She hung 'round the rock bars, guys that played guitars, she'd do anything for another white line

Her life got so funny, she owed so much money, more than a doctor or lawyer could make

She walked in that farmhouse scared as a trapped mouse knowing full well that her life was at stake



Cocaine Katy, Cocaine Katy, they made her dance,made her plead, made her beg

Down that country lane cool and shady, gave her a warning, and then broke her leg



Once you're abusin' you gotta keep usin', Katy kept runnin' right back to the store

All the time knowin', her bill, it was growin', soon she was owin' as much as before

They took her, and used her, when they'd abused her, said to themselves, "Now we can't let her go."

Young, but so jaded, she's killed, half cremated, laid in the ground for a handfull of blow



Cocaine Katy, Cocaine Katy, out of the dark I can still hear your cries

Governments debate, for you it's too damned late, how many more before they realise

Before you control it you have to hold it, drugs are for doctors not punks on the street

Please legislate it, we can regulate it, how many times must her story repeat



Cocaine Katy wasn't a lady, she wasn't even no friend of mine

Cocaine Katy, Cocaine Katy, out of the dark I can still hear your cries





Ivan's Map



Well they say he crossed over from Russia, on an ice berg one long winters night

With a sack full of hundred proof vodka after killing a cop in a fight

As the prospectors climbed up the trail they all laughed at the babbling clown

Passing drinks out like it was a party, the fool was going back down



Well, he came into town about Easter, as the winter night gave way to dawn

And he went right away to buyer, he'd a mighty nice nugget to pawn

So he put up a shack by the river, then he sent for a load of that booze

He hung up a shingle outside it, It said, Ivan's Bar and Tattoos



Well the bad times they came like the good times, whenever he got strapped for cash

Ivan snuck off to who knows where to return with a lump from his stash

We all knew that he wasn't that clever, that he must have a map to that store

So we looked, but we never could find it, then we found out from Lilly, the whore



That it never came off of his person, 'cause that silly Siberian nut

In a fit of divine inspiration he had tattooed the thing on his butt

So we snuck round in back of the parlor, to the Sears catalog reading room

With a saw we arranged for a viewing, and we plotted the man's stash's doom



It was winter again when we cut us that portal to fiscal success

Ivan, I guess he was sick then, our first glimpse turned out quite a mess

But we cleaned up as best as we could then, and we walked in as neat as you please

With a plan just so perfect you'd marvel, and twenty pound wheel of cheese



We all cozied right up close to Ivan, and we let him know that we'd heard tell

That his insides were feeling right poorly, and the cheese it would make him quite well

So we traded him vodka for cheese there, and the trading it played like a hit

Then the Russian rose, made his excuses, and he headed out back, for a bit



By the time we got into our place there the map was displayed perfectly

The light was coal miner's blessing, not too glaring, enough just to see

Dirty Frank, he commenced with the drawing, 'twas a good job, a fool could tell

And Ivan, he never moved nothing, there was writing Frank copied as well



We all thought it was written in Russian, for we couldn't decode not a phrase

So we just headed into the mountains, to try to decipher the maze

Well, I got out soon after the thaw came, the others, please, thanks, don't you ask

Bone chilled, I was starving to splinters, I went to down to get me a flask



Someone told me how Ivan had froze there, with the butt, with the map all a flout

'Cause he wouldn't leave unfinished business, and he couldn't work anything out

Then I heard how the old undertaker, had suddenly struck it quite rich 

That he'd gone to the French Riviera, and along with him, Lilly, the snitch



Well I just got a package from Paris, just a little scroll, in with a note

With a mirror packed carefully with it, the old undertaker had wrote

The writing was English, just backward, to tattoo yourself on the ass

And to have it come clear you must see it, check the butt flap in this looking glass





Depression



I will take up the knife in my hand

... For my dreams

I will go out to fight with the wind

... How it screams

The wind, how it ruins the land

... Blown away

Oh my Lord can you say how I've sinned

... I will pray

Now the bank wants to take it away

... All is lost

I must stop the wind, yes I must

... Any cost

The money was due yesterday

... It's too late

The payment, there's nothing but dust

... Dust and hate

We were sleek on the fat of the land

... Me and John

Now the soil's blown into the river

... He's gone

No more garden, and nothing left canned

... I can't sleep

The wind sets the cabin a quiver

... That shriek

I will fight off the wind in the yard

... With the knife

I will fight off the dust in the hills

... For my life

But, the wind, I can't fight, it's too hard

... I am weak

Now the wind turns the knife, the wind kills

... Death I seek