Well, his full name is Bruce Thomas. The location is Weaver Street Market, a hang-out for the town folks of Carrboro and people of Chapel Hill come here as well. There is the co-op market and the lawn where they have tables and often there is music provided by bands. Families come with their kids, or individuals come. It’s where you go if you live in Carrboro. In March, the Independent Weekly, our local, weekly paper did a story that is available online here. So, while I sat there at a table outside, I wrote this.

Footloose Bruce

I saw Footloose Bruce
at Weaver Street Market,
a local hangout for our town.
He sat alone… walked across the lawn alone.

I read about him in the local paper recently,
an occasional curiosity,
most of the time,
I see him here,
alone.

No one notices him today -
there’s no music.
He seems invisible and purposeless,
this evening,
but maybe he feels something
I cannot feel -
carefree to just be,
always in the spirit and flow
of life’s rhythms,
like the tai chi
that is a part of his dance
when the music plays.

I wonder if he comes here
to make a connection
or just to look for some motion
and to become a part of the motion.
He dances with the kids
on the lawn but it still seems
to me, that he is dancing alone.

There will be more music here,
and Footloose Bruce will remain famous
as he dances
alone.

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This blog is published by Bruce Whealton, more information about Bruce Whealton is here… Bruce Whealton is the owner of Future Wave Designs, a North Carolina Company providing Web Design and Web Development. Visit:
NC Web Design:Future Wave Designs

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This poem is another true story. This is about a homeless person I helped. I was going to say more but maybe I shouldn’t, because as I say in the poem, maybe I really cannot know what this is about, I mean with her.

The Stalker

She passed me at the market
where I sat there reading…
seemed innocent enough,
she said nothing,
just smiled to let me know
she saw me.

Just to let me know
she saw me;
she didn’t want to talk.
We never even were friends.

So, what did she want?

We were never friends,
never lovers.
What did she want?

Just to let me know
she saw me…
or that she was there.

She was inside my home,
I discovered,
just recently.
there were just a few signs,
but enough
to let me know,
she was there.

I suppose she imagines
I am afraid.
Perhaps that’s what she wants.

How many times
had she been near by,
watching,
so close and unseen,
like a snake,
in the shadows,
outside my door,
that I nearly step on.

What does she want?

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This blog is published by Bruce Whealton, more information about Bruce Whealton is here… Bruce Whealton is the owner of Future Wave Designs, a North Carolina Company providing Web Design and Web Development. Visit:
NC Web Design:Future Wave Designs

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Here is a dark poem about a girl that I almost let back into my life. That would have been dangerous. Am I being cruel to compare her to an encounter with a snake? Have you met her?

The Seduction

I cannot believe she’d contact me
after what she did to me!
And the gall, to think I’d actually
speak to her.

I guess it’s the part of me
that loves horror stories,
loves roller coasters…

I think about snakes.
I have a phobia of snakes,
and yet, every time I visit
Wilmington, I go to the Serpentarium,
where they have so many snakes,
as well as other reptiles,
behind glass enclosures,
so close you can almost touch them.

However, repulsed by snakes,
I’m drawn to this place
and mainly to the snakes.
I look and watch them
sitting or slithering about,
or I watch the cobra
rise up 3 feet or more off the ground…
I read about how deadly each snakes is…
my hand, my fingers move
in front of a small enclosure
and the small snakes follow
my movements.

I can feel chills
run up my back,
as I imagine
these enclosures
breaking and all these
snakes filling these rooms.

I suppose it’s like that with her,
Amanda.

I’m repulsed and yet
curious; fascinated -
in a morbid way -
like I am by stories
about serial killers
and other sociopaths…
I’m not alone…

We want to know
something about them.
Why they do what they do.

Yet, with that demon,
Amanda,
I nearly invited her into my home
again,
letting some dark desire
squirm its way around my brain…

I’m safe though.
She never got her invitation -
she never crossed that threshold,
as far as I can remember.

So, I’m safe -

This time.

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This blog is published by Bruce Whealton, more information about Bruce Whealton is here… Bruce Whealton is the owner of Future Wave Designs, a North Carolina Company providing Web Design and Web Development. Visit:
NC Web Design:Future Wave Designs

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My poetry mentor, Dr. Martin Kirby, told me never to write love poems. He had several reasons. One was that they are so common, so many poets through the centuries had written such poems that it was almost impossible to come up with anything original. I just heard from a student of his and that got me thinking about Martin, his advice. I guess it was good advice, as back then, in 91, I was writing about having been a love that I had known and the grief of loss I had felt after she died. He said it would take me 10 years to be able to write about that… The loss and the love? It seems that they were one in the same, almost, in this instance.

When one thinks of the word love, it does seem to have unclear meaning, or at least to me. Even in-love is used in ways, I would not use it. I read of a psychologist advising his client that he would fall in-love many times. So, how does one describe that singular experience that happens only once, or maybe twice, perhaps three times in a life time (if it happens 2 or 3 times something tragic, traumatic or grave must have happened along the way)?

Anyway, I don’t know what made me think of love at this time but here is where I discovered that singular type of love. It’s a rather straightforward poem.

Where The Love Was and Is

They said you were an angry woman -
I could see it as well…
but where was your anger at me?
Could you be so angry at the whole world
but not at me?

I guess that has something to do
with love – our love.
I kept waiting for that anger
to turn on me,
for me to do something
to provoke anger,
yet I only seemed to see
your smiles at me.

That’s where the love was.

And what about all the
“I love you’s”
we exchanged -
I never heard those words
so many times -
I never felt so inspired
to say that so much,
up to then.

That’s where the love was.

Or maybe it was in certain
snapshot memories…
the time we sat in the park,
I was sharing a story from my past,
a not so fascinating story, I thought,
and looking up,
I notice you looking at me,
with such interest -
interest in me -
and love.
I still remember this,
20 years later.

That’s where our love was.

Finally, it was in all tears
I shed after I heard you died,
I’d never cried before that.

Actually, the love is in the memories
and in the knowledge
that you are always a part of me
and I a part of you,
and the comfort that brings.

I guess, the love isn’t
just in a place long ago.

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This blog is published by Bruce Whealton, more information about Bruce Whealton is here… Bruce Whealton is the owner of Future Wave Designs, a North Carolina Company providing Web Design and Web Development. Visit:
NC Web Design:Future Wave Designs

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I am

I am
like this poem
written
on the first day
of spring,
indeed,
the warmest day
this year.

There will be new life,
new revisions.

I’m ripe with imagination.
I see leaves
on still bare trees
and so can you.
Just pause with me,
read me.
Look! Look!
See what I see,
even when there’s nothing
there.

I want to be read.
I want to be loved.
I want to be born again,
reinvented,
revised and revised
and revised,
forever.

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This blog is published by Bruce Whealton, more information about Bruce Whealton is here… Bruce Whealton is the owner of Future Wave Designs, a North Carolina Company providing Web Design and Web Development. Visit:
NC Web Design:Future Wave Designs

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Another one of my experiences with knots, social knots… my observations.

In Certain Social Situations

I came to a party
everyone was playing a game.
I know they were playing a game
but I don’t know how to play
because I never learned
how to play.

What if they were playing a game
of pretending to play
a different game
or what if they just seemed
to be playing one game
when they were actually playing
another game?

I was afraid I’d play the wrong game
and never be allowed
to play more games
even though,
I don’t think,
I ever played
any of these games,
because I never knew what game
they were playing…
or if I was playing
the game,
I didn’t know
I was playing the game
nor did I know,
if I was playing the right
game
or not.

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This blog is published by Bruce Whealton, more information about Bruce Whealton is here… Bruce Whealton is the owner of Future Wave Designs, a North Carolina Company providing Web Design and Web Development. Visit:
NC Web Design:Future Wave Designs

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Act Naturally – Part II

Naturally, I want to act,
naturally
and act on my feelings
but not too quickly.

I have to know,
what I really feel
so I’ll know what I want
and so I’ll act naturally
without having to stop
and think about
what I feel
I want.

I want to feel
like I’m acting
naturally.

I want to feel
that I know
what I want
and so I won’t have to think
about what I feel
I want
or think about
how to best act
naturally.

People learn these things
naturally.

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This blog is published by Bruce Whealton, more information about Bruce Whealton is here… Bruce Whealton is the owner of Future Wave Designs, a North Carolina Company providing Web Design and Web Development. Visit:
NC Web Design:Future Wave Designs

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So, R.D. Laing is this psychiatrist from the 60s that absolutely fascinated me. He wrote about his experiences with people with schizophrenia. In addition, much of his writing can be expanded to social relationships and social communication and how confusing it can become. He put out this collection of poems called “Knots” that deal with just what I was describing – not schizophrenic communication but everyday communication that can be confusing and get tangled in knots. It inspired me to write my own knots. I can safely say that I am not copying his poems or just adding to the collection; I’ve found my own knots and in many ways they are very personal observations of what confuses me. As an introduction, let me reproduce the first poem, or maybe it is the first part of a poem. He has this book Knots and it is divided into 4 chapters but on each page you can read what seem like poems in themselves. So, from page one he writes:

“They are playing a game. They are playing at not
playing a game. If I show them I see they are, I
shall break the rules and they will punish me.
I must play their game, of not seeing, I see the game.”

In my knots poems, I deal with some very different things than the games he is describing. Yet, one or two of my poems deal with games. I was trying in those two, to express my confusion, my own personal confusion that comes from having been shy. I certainly am inspired by personal experiences that many would describe as characteristic of shyness. I’ve worked in the psych field and been trained in the field and have the benefit of discussing the matter with colleagues of mine or others similarly trained. We have come to agree that my experiences do represent shyness. Anyway, I’ve always had a desire to be heard, understood… that’s the writer in me… to express my deeply felt experiences in a very genuine way. Perhaps some reader will relate. So, here is another one of my poems inspired by “Knots.”

Act Naturally

Just act naturally!
Naturally, I am learning,
just what to do,
naturally.

Do people learn, naturally,
how to act natural?

I must learn social skills
so that I will know
what to do, naturally,
when I want to act,
naturally.

Part II – Discovering the game

I am just learning
for the first time,
that sometimes,
people are playing games,
when I had not known
they were playing a game.

Related Links:

• Wilmington Poetry Reading: Featuring Ana Ribeiro, followed by Bruce Whealton
• New poem by Bruce Whealton
• Watching You – poem by Bruce Whealton
• Four of my poems now in "The Horror Zine" online
• My poem "An Infinite Beach" appears in Wild Goose Poetry Review

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This blog is published by Bruce Whealton, more information about Bruce Whealton is here… Bruce Whealton is the owner of Future Wave Designs, a North Carolina Company providing Web Design and Web Development. Visit:
NC Web Design:Future Wave Designs

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From Bruce Whealton: Career, Interests and Values, post Footloose Bruce – Poem by Bruce Whealton

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Change

My friend, who I’ve not seen in decades,
writes about how utterly happy he has been
for the past couple days…
it’s just something that people share
through the magic of electronics and social networking…

It made me think of all the time
that’s passed and wonder about
what changes? And What remains the same?

Hair changes,
weight changes…
memories remain (some)…
Mannerisms develop
and remain
as part of who we are
or have become;
some of this is inherited.

Shyness self-sustains
like a bad eduction.

Skills fade,
friends fade,
remain, reappear.

I was taught
happiness should have existed
and then gradually
declined – my teachers
must only have had distant
memories of happiness
but they never spoke of it.

Maybe happiness is possible
through the comfort
of forgetting -
forgetting the time that’s passed,
what we’ve lost,
what’s faded.

I feel like, I know,
my friend would have dreaded
the loss of so much
of his hair,
(why did I notice that
about him?)
as if it had something
to with one’s worth
and social worth -
happiness?

Maybe I shouldn’t ponder
these thoughts,
questioning the value
of memories,
if there’s such value
in forgetting.

I wonder about the title on this. Surely, I’ll have many thoughts on change and so no one poem can sum up the concept of change.

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This blog is published by Bruce Whealton, more information about Bruce Whealton is here… Bruce Whealton is the owner of Future Wave Designs, a North Carolina Company providing Web Design and Web Development. Visit:
NC Web Design:Future Wave Designs

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