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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0

Alan Wildeman

Poems*

It Takes Two Dreams

I dreamed last night I was you
It's a dream that keeps coming in twos
It takes living to know about life
It takes two dreams to walk in your shoes

One dream was of traveling the world
The cobblestone, the cafés, the nights
Then I had that old dream about falling
With arms like stringless kites

A siren is coming near
The debt is coming due
Two dreams last night about martyrs
I dreamed last night I was you
There's a light in the hollow tree
I'm going to go and get me some
Just need a little shine for our road
I don't care where it's from
I dreamed last night I was you.

From the album "Unsheltered" c2020

Contemporary

Turn up the heat, let me take off my hood
There's no more need for a flint and some wood
Flip that switch, throw some light
Edison made sure I'll see you tonight

<footnote>* These poems are the lyrics of the songs appearing in the two albums *The Apologist* (2016) and *Unsheltered* (2020).</footnote>
It's all so easy, let's crack some champagne
No more drinking water, from puddles of rain
It's good to be with you with no bags to carry
We've checked ourselves in, we're contemporary

There's a reason they call me the modern man
I get contemporary just as fast as I can
I love you now with every chance I get
But I might get more contemporary yet

No need to worry, take trust for a start
I've Googled commitment, there's a picture of my heart
Let me turn on the taps, and run you a bath
The good Lord giveth what the good Lord hath

Can I lather your back, and maybe sing you some hymns?
It's what a modern guy does when his confidence brims
It's nice to be with you with no bags to carry
We're doing the old contemporary

There's a reason they call me the modern man
I get contemporary, just as fast as I can
I love you now with every chance I get
But I might get more contemporary yet.

From the album "The Apologist" c2016

## A Cowboy Never Falls

There you go again, you're hiding your heart
Inside your house, the doors won't part
You breathe a sigh, in the morning light
You've gotten through, through another night
Can't see you now, this fog is like a ghost
In the mist you're doing, what you love the most
You're holding your face, against your cold stone walls
A cowboy staggers, but a cowboy never falls
The Prince of Peace, had no family tree
His holy house, was his legacy
You picked a meadow, took a hammer and a nail
You built your own, though there's houses for sale
All the curtains are drawn, the shades are down
I heard you're training, to be a clown

I know it was hard, maybe too much
To offer everything, to everyone that you touch
You'd open your heart, to anyone who came
They'd take what they want, you'd do the same
Love is a game, where a tie is a win
You hide your loss behind a painted grin

No one knows what's going on inside
You broke a lot of broncos, for your mail order brides
Again you found a bargain, and again it disappoints
There were no fireworks, no dovetail joints
Was it you, was it them, that you were trying to pin
With your stories of the burdens you carried within

Your horses are ready, to ride for the boss
The mailbox empty, a casino of loss
The postman arrived, with empty hands
He left with boxes full of your plans
Plans for a clown in a rodeo show
Making them laugh, everywhere you go

You were seen, walking in the night
Your shadow cast by the immortal moonlight
Into the graveyard, where the oak tree bends
Where lives the danger of ancient friends
No right or wrong, no in between
No saddlebags, on the black limousine

You're holding your face, against your cold stone walls
A cowboy staggers, but a cowboy never falls.

From the album "Unsheltered" c2020

The Apologist

Well I'm finally, I'm here at your door.
I'm nervous, I'm sore.
This takes a man's bravery, yes it's true.
But a good man knows it's the only thing to do.
So let me in, let me take a chair.
it took me all day, all day to prepare.
You said where are you? I'm here with the answer.
I'm here to apologize for my infidelity and my cancer.

Yes I met a lady, she paints with her hair.
She dips it in reds and blues
and colours my shoulders and more,
when she kisses me from up there.
And gravity draws her brush to my waiting skin.
She makes me forget the despair that I'm in.
Remember me saying that I had a dream.
I've carried it with me since you and I met at thirteen.
I dream I am a rainbow, my wish has been answered.
I'm here to apologize for my infidelity and my cancer.

Her hands so gently go to the little pots of gold
that legend says anchor the base
of those colourful arcs.
And when she peaks on me
her joyful hairy shudders, they leave marks
of abstract traces, abstract traces.
She knows what it takes for what a man faces.
Well I tease her that my canvas,
my canvas is her masterpiece.
We polaroid sections of my body,
and sell them to unsuspecting galleries
as works, as works by some new master.
I'm here to apologize for my infidelity and my cancer.

We hit pay dirt, we hit pay dirt, with last night's frescoes.
I drank my best wine, you know how the rest goes.
We sold them close-up studies of Monet gardens,
of Picassos and Rembrandts
and lava before it hardens.
I was transformed by a night of passion.
Her creations are never out of fashion.
I did it, I'm sorry, I'm not a liar or a dancer
I'm here to apologize for my infidelity and my cancer.

She waits, she waits until she's sure I'm free,
in a room where I sat waiting
for what grows inside of me.
Portraits, and nature scenes, she's done them all.
I apologize, you don't deserve this call.
Her brush will soon be found on another apologist,
and my dreams will be lost
somewhere in the morning mist,
where eyes once danced and shone for you
when I was still so healthy and so whole
and I loved you true.

I've lost the rhyme, but the rhythm won't part.
There's a little boy's foot still tapping inside my heart.
Like those bunnies camouflaged as dust,
I'm beneath that bed where I earned your trust.
Now I'm the scattered leaves along your lane.
I'm your breath that fogs on a chilly window pane.
I'm the smell of spring and the morning dew.
I'm the twig that snaps beneath your shoe.

Well I'm finally, I'm here at your door.
I'm nervous, I'm sore.
I'm here where I crowned you the queen of the damned,
where I gave you a wish and you wished for my hand.
I'm now blades of grass on your welcome mat.
I'm the fingerprints on the brim of that hat.
You said where are you? and I'm here with the answer.
I'm here to apologize for my infidelity and my cancer.

From the album "The Apologist" c2016

## Misplaced Roses

There's that old cobweb on the wall, it's trapping misplaced roses
It floats upon my 7-up and smothers all the bubbles
Fastens all the memories down with all its master's weaving
Trapping misplaced roses and trapping misplaced troubles

Well I knew that it was tricky and I knew there's seldom pity
On a man who's finally sure that it is true what he supposes
I opened up the windows and the cobwebs now are blowing
And the birds sing out the warning - there'll be no more misplaced roses
There'll be no more misplaced troubles, take me to a place above
There'll be no more misplaced roses my love

At least a million roses were scattered every evening
Who knows how many eyes have seen the thorn but not the bloom
I walked into a place and held my face against the window
I saw the misplaced roses inside that misplaced room

Hans and Sophie, Alexander, Christoph, Kurt and Willi
In a tangled world of sorrow, in a tangled web of woes
In rooms controlled by spiders who spin their webs like madmen
Every hope is smothered, every voice a misplaced rose

Awake from sleep and lift the veil, so reads the manifesto
The time has come for all good men to fear a nation's goal
In Stadelheim in Munich town the guillotine had bartered
A country's misplaced roses for a nation's misplaced soul

There's a million men and women who are lying in the forest
Where the goblins prance and the fairies dance on history's nightshade blooms
I walked into a place and held my face against the doorway
There's a million misplaced roses, there's a million misplaced rooms

There are rooms behind the hedges where the flower beds are empty
Where the last touch of the children was their little fingertips and noses
So we'll open up the window and the cobwebs will be blowing
And the birds sing out the warning - there'll be no more misplaced roses

There'll be no more misplaced troubles, take me to a place above
There'll be no more misplaced roses my love.

From the album "The Apologist" c2016

**Alan Wildeman**, PhD, is President Emeritus of the University of Windsor in Canada. His academic degrees in biology are from the University of Saskatchewan and the University of Guelph. His research career focused on molecular genetics and biotechnology, and in addition to Canada he has worked in research institutes in France and Germany. He has released two albums of original songs, *The Apologist* in 2016 and *Unsheltered* in 2020, both available on all major streaming outlets. The albums have been described as prairie surrealism.
[agwildeman@gmail.com](mailto:agwildeman@gmail.com)