Music and lyrics to “Never tell a lie” by Thomas Arthur Turner (@1938)

Here’s a little suggestion and it might be hard to take
Thats if you’re the type who is inclined to prevaricate
It’s just a little psychology that ev’ry man should know
If he’s to be the perfect Romeo, so

Never tell a lie, here’s the reason why
Someone might believe the things you say are on the level, darling,
You might break a heart, and that’s no way to start romance.

Things you say and do, might thrill her thru and thru, but if they’re on the sly I’m telling you
You’ll make her cry, now darling, that’s no way to do, before love starts you’re through.

So never, never tell her that you love her, unless its from the bottom of your heart
For there will come a time when she’ll discover that your love for her was just a lark.

Then you’ll be a lone, by the telephone, all the girls will find
That you’ve been handing them a line, now darling,
Thats the reason why, it never pays to tell a lie.

Your Smile

Music  and lyrics by Thomas Arthur Turner

There are many thing about you
Too numerous to mention here
But the thing that made me love you-
Listen while I tell you dear

Your smile opened the door to my heart
So that I knew from the start
That you were the one for me

Your smile found I was lonesome and blue
Waiting for someone like you
A dream that you made come true

The night that we met
-could I ever forget-
I completely surrendered to you
I feel that way yet
And I’ll never regret
Even tho’ you might say we were through

Your smile lifts me to heaven above
so that I know I’m in love
In love with your smile and you.
Lyrics and music by Thomas Arthur Turner (sometime around 1938)

It didn’t ask to
Be there, the paint
On the canvas. But
Then none of us
When made,
had hand on the brush.
Sculpted from pink
Wax,
allowing light
In others lives. Until
Melted
And clinging in the
Dark,
to the table top.
Ground with a
Fine tool
from quartz.
The edges sharp.
Slowly
Making it art as each
Bead might be handled
In prayer.
They aren’t
Fools
reaching out
And cut by the edges
Sharp.
I think it is
Passion,
passion knows
No future, and visionless
Its blood
colors the
Carved leaves in red.

RLB 5/12/2022

Whatever color it is
A hovering gray
Of a sky, of a day
There is feeling of
a careful distance
From the several
window panes
To stay.
With the glass
misinforming
as an empty
sunroom will.

Whatever color it is.
A tear stain gray
in years so still the
drawn in cell walls
become by
discouraged dreams
of home.

Whatever color it is.
An age made gray
why ask
when it became
white… perhaps made
In the small agony
of surprises
each time
in the
image the
mirror provides.
Though not in lying,
It will not make
plain the next
time is not the
last time.
The finger snap
of one time
already passed.

RLB 04/28/2022

I saw you in the semi-darkness
stepping on the work bench
foot rest
one dark heel below the other
and the glass shade held
by the hand that created it.
Bound and belonging on
a foundaried base.
The art in reverse
On the glass, maybe cosmos
Dangling
Or thick dahlia….
The light was less so,
the Jerusalem lily unbrightened,
As though through
settled fogginess
silently asking it be
brought to me
brought to me
and no other.

RLB 04/27/2022

Once to every man and nation,
Comes the moment to decide,
In the strife of truth with falsehood,
For the good or evil side;
Some great cause, God’s new Messiah,
Offering each the bloom or blight,
And the choice goes by forever,
‘twixt that darkness and that light.
– James Russell Lowell

With you, inside,
from the pachysandra,
a barrage of deep green
and cheering white, soothing
And electrifying
protecting ardor from thought.
On the cast bench,
all debts paid,
drawn back to the boxwoods
aside the
crushed stone path
A smokey whiskey
and black poplar parasol
matching the thick sky,
no contemplation only
an industrial puff in the air
left
From the end of work days
facing a bellowing fire
miles to the east.
Let questions go unanswered,
I wonder if there is anyone
with the confidence
To fill in what you think

RLB 03-22-2022

To see into the soul

Peak in twenty five

Million windows

Of a spiral dart

In dubai.

To see is supposed

To be to believe

And so peek at

Me figuring again

A way lift myself

into the cold

Night sky.

I don’t know much

Not even what

Not to know. Look

For love and lose

Even that, the tears

Speak way too little

When you cry.

Should David not

throw a stone

The scars that are

Left, the story

At the bar, the

Brother’s return

Letting go another

Sling to fly.

RLB 03/01/2022

The vinca, un-bloomed, ready for

Its’ planting, cupped in the hand.

Knees bent to the ground, the same

from which the roots will sift for

food. The white, as your skin

would be had not the sun saw fit

to freckle and darken it. There is

no reminding me of you in the red,

no rouge from the finger, so few

adornments you choose. The name

of the color, lilac, not violet, paired

with lace beneath the neck, will

be this summer’s dress.

RLB 02/09/2022

He places the gold
Banded watch from
His father on the dresser
Top.
People don’t have to
Be bad.
Her crescent
ear rings
Unclipped. The rest
Are in
The soft pink box, some
Gold trim left, though
Like Childhood,
now parts
have rubbed away.
People can be
Kind, with a smile and
An unambiguous okay.
Saturday on the main
Street, the felt fedora
The cashmere scarf,
They stroll before
Store windows,
With Christmas coming
next
The manikins are cold.
So was said, give
of yourself, it never
Will grow old.
But in the game
of freeze tag
some never heard
the word to go.
The kids will bring
Their kids tomorrow.
They ask to light
The dinner table’s
Candles and why
The bed’s so high.
Abandoning the
Question before
Can come an answer.