BILLY MITCHELL

Today in my mind but yesterday was a long time ago,

I think of you, a place and a school, I was a little boy.

It was nineteen sixty-seven, Kindergarten and you,

The first day of school is recalled in my mind, a boy I saw cry,

His name Was Cotero, I think of those clowns on a wall.

Are they still there? I wonder, swingsets and young friends,

A boy named Grover, Duck, Duck, goose, Graham crackers and milk.

Naptime, I remember the cabinets with cartoonish pictures,

Reading time was the best, Foldout books, three-dimensional stories,

Hansel and Gretel, all the best, I was there until nineteen seventy.

Hard to remember the teachers’ names, Mrs. Scott back in second grade,

I think it was Mr. Kelly, Principal with dark hair and glasses,

John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt was a song in the Cafeteria.

After school and on the weekends you could play games,

Carroms, maze, and more, Billy Mitchell, when once I was a child.

Friends, Jeff, James, Jimmy, and Alan, wherever they are, I remember,

There was a bell back then known as the freeze bell, stand very still.

We all have our childhood, our memories, a town to call home, then we roam,

Billy Mitchell, I find myself wandering back to you, memories of a school.

Keith Garrett

A CLEAR SPRING NIGHT

I await you as the sun goes down, a breeze blowing cool,

There will be a full moon rising in the sky tonight.

Jasmine is a fragrance noticed in the nights of spring,

Sweet is its smell as darkness awakes and the daylight sleeps.

The cold bite of Winter becomes a memory for now,

Summers heat has not yet been born, this feeling of spring.

Walk with me hand, in hand under a full moon so bright,

A clear, Spring night is alright, with a woman of beauty I walk.

A dreaming man tells a story of a walk with a beautiful woman,

Under a full moon on a clear, Spring night, he waits.

Keith Garrett

LISTEN TO THE DRUMBEAT

Thump, thump, hear the sound that makes the world go around,

Feel the pounding of its rhythm, the drum beats hard, the heart beats fast.

Listen to the drumbeat that lives inside, listen to music, the drumbeat cries,

Boom, boom, echoes through the sky, thunder is the drum, it beats out loud.

Wait for the rumbling as the shaking earth trembles with an awesome fear,

Bang, bang, listen as the sleeping child’s heart comes to life in the dark of night.

Bombs and gunfire sing through the war beaten land, thump, thump,

The drum beats slow, the drum beats fast, a mother’s terror as her son dies.

The dancing boxer, hard hit as he is dropped to the floor, beat of his heart,

Thump, thump, boom, boom, goes his heart like the drumbeat so slow.

Listen to the drumbeat, to the sound of wandering feet, like a drum,

A first breath of life, a slower, and slower beat of the fading, going away.

Keith Garrett

I JUST WANTED TO CALL

You have moved on, I see your number has changed,

Your phone only rings as never again will you answer.

I just wanted to call and see how you are doing since you left,

Do you like it there, are there hills and valleys?

What memories do you hold of your time here on Earth,

Do you think of us just as we think of you, what do you do?

I just wanted to call to let you know that I love you always,

I’ll try again on another day, I hope you get my message.

Love you, Mom
Keith

TO SIT IN THE SAND

By myself with the wind in my face,

Watching out towards the horizon, I sit in the sand.

Above, only sky that has not an ending to my eyes,

Birds that fly, drift silently on by.

The waves are a sight, crashing on the beach,

Who would be the man who sat here once and dared to dream?

To sit in the sand, warm to the touch of my feet,

Thoughts fill my wandering mind, what things do all of this teach.

To sit in the sand, peaceful is where I am,

Memory’s of times, all that i did in life,

Felt from inside.

Keith Garrett

TO SAVE HIS DAUGHTER

Already did he sacrifice his life for his country and family,

Doing what it took, in harm’s way each day to make things safe.

He has survived many dangerous fights in nights of fright,

He was now home, wanted some peace and too know his child,

When they took his daughter, they would know no peace.

A military man, a promise to get her back, to save his daughter,

This was his job, now a personal fight for a loved one’s life.

To save his daughter this man would risk it all, he would not fail,

Not about honor but for his love of a daughter.

Keith Garrett

HAUNTING CRIMES

There may be echoes if you listen really close,

I think they just might wander where they died.

From way back in time, Nazi Germany and haunting crimes,

Not part of any war, these cowardly monsters from a European time.

Crimes against humanity, crimes against heaven and god,

Innocent souls, tortured and discarded as if they were nothing.

Do they rest in peace or do many linger, wander lost in a lost place,

Haunting crimes, the living remember for the dead, horrible times.

I pray they rest in peace, a new life in heaven, saved from the horrible beast,

I fear that some still roam in that place, set them free, let them be.

Keith Garrett

LOST IN THE WIND

The wind blows, where it goes only it knows,

An echo that sounds whenever it be around.

Listen when it roars, when it sleeps, hear the peace,

Feel the wind as it will move all around, touches what is found.

In the wind, what things do get lost, yesterdays thoughts,

Leaves from the trees, branches, or what tomorrow could bring,

Lost in the wind, material things, a soul that sings, everything.

Keith Garrett

I BECOME REAL

I am fantasy, I come to life in dreams in the night,

I am not real, a made up story created from a pen.

A cartoon, monster, fables, or nursery rhymes,

I become real with the Imagination from a mind.

Superheroes and Frankenstein do not walk the streets,

Magic spells, wizards, and wooden boys are not really seen.

I become real when the world is a scary place to see,

All things that are Impossible are me when you believe,

I become real when what you pretend does never end.

Keith Garrett

EVERYBODY’S GOING THROUGH SOMETHING

It is that people move each day, go their own way,

A struggle to survive, a faster pace in their lives.

Are we really living or merely trying to get through the day?

In between that which we do exists a fight of our own.

Some of us do it alone, others with much help from caring ones,

We never leave ourselves as we travel along with a tune in our head.

Mentally or physically, we all have something happening always,

Everybody’s going through something and we can never run from it.

Keith Garrett