Poetry of a Pedi-cab Driver
by James M. Branum








Bullet-hole Car



Red Wine



Falling in Love



Radio







Falling in Love



Falling,
Falling,
I'm falling in love.
If love is so grand,
then why I am I falling?

At first, love seems like I'm jumping! I'm flying!
I'm landing onto a giant soft feather bed.

I love the thrill of flying,
but even the falling is so much fun!

Later, though love is more like a bad dream;
You know, the one where you're falling off a cliff
and every detail, every last nano-second of the descent
is experienced in technicolor reality.
And then, just before the awful moment of contact with Tierra Firma,
you wake up.

That's what love is like
because there's always that primal fear
that the one I love is about to be lost forever
and that soon I'll be colliding with the hard reality of it.

Then the dream comes back to visit again and again.
This time, It's more real than ever!
Every foot, every inch of the fall is recorded in my dreambrain's CPU.
But this time, I don't wake up.

I don't know why those sappy love songs are full of
either the happy-happy-joy-joy feelings of romantic bliss
or the dramatic but ennobling tales of love lost.
Those songs candy-coat the truth.
Love is a four-letter word, and believe me,
Falling in love hurts like hell.







Chains



Desert of my Soul



Restless on the Highway



The People I meet



Poetry of a Pedi-cab driver (c) 2000,2001 James M. Branum (Chains and Desert of My Soul previous published at www.vagrantcafe.com. Cover photo taken from mudgut.com)