Walldren's World

This Sunday's poem was written many years ago and inspired by the copious amounts of "French" music I was listening to in the early 2000's. Enjoy. Bohemian Urge by Scott Walldren Oh to be a Bohemian and live the life of the street musician, except for in the wintertime, of course, when my accordion would freeze to the money-collecting monkey’s paw and he would have to be chopped free from my shoulder by some kindly axe-wielding passerby. And then of course, I’d have to buy a new accordion. And a new monkey. Hmm. But how sweet it could be! Sitting on a bench in the park or on the sill of a shop window, playing outside with my heart’s joys and sorrows for the occasional scrap of a dollar. To above all be free from pretension and simply be, to feel the note soar in my heart and fly out through my hands as they squeeze the life out of the box. And then there would be the policeman. “Do you have a license to perform?” he would ask. “Does one need a...

Today's service at our church was about poetry. So, for the first time in many years I stood before a room full of people and nervously read the following poem that I wrote way back when. The things that can cause anxiety never really cease however our response to them can. That's what I think prompted me to write this. Spring Blossom by Scott Walldren After a while I will shed my skin and thank the powers for another time to be. Another time to live and grow, like a spring blossom. Brought into being by such a turbulent start, thunder, lightning, rain giving life. The great fear. Where does it all end and I begin? And then there becomes that particular quiet, the distant final rattle of thunder over the horizon and the haze begins to clear. I will now finally be able to meet the sun. Only then can I say that "I am" again. But sometimes old snakeskin dreams lay all around me and I choke on the dander of a different day. Great fear returns. My...