Sharing here because this is the place to share. True story. Best to all here in the Blundernation.

len

Hippie Heaven

I woke up from an awesome dream
Of The People who live in the Berkshire green
I was friends with Arlo again
Who talked of peace forgettin' sin
There was Banjo Pete sitting next to me
Playing old black gospel gingerly
I said hello to Sarah Lee
Then sneaking in came Mrs G
Surprising Arlo who jumped with glee
Young as spring she took his hand
They went off together. I could understand
I wandered away to an informal crowd
They were mixing it up and singing loud
Sharing herb and laughing at The Man
Who was really a woman talking to her hand
The folksingers sang
The band counted seven
I sat in with them in hippie heaven
I woke up feeling awfully sad
It was just a dream that a sinner had
So I wrote it down to tell the tale
To the rest of you in the morning pale
I wish I belonged to that shaggy gang
In the little white church where they all sang
Songs of peace and joy and love
Where the stars shine down from the sky above
The one who sent that dream knows my heart
And put me here in a warrior's part
Remember me in the final verse,
A fool with a fighting soul or worse
Just another lonely dreaming kid
Who got too old and never did
Join the chorus of the glorious session
In the ranks of the forgiven in hippie heaven.

len bullard (who woke up and wrote this down before it slipped away)

Enjoyed the above...
If there is a Heaven Len let be your hippie one (Eureka! the forth heaven)

Peace and sweet dreams!

Thanks Woodstock. I don't know about heaven and I certainly can't say anything about the church or the berkshires that others here can't say who have more experience. It was a dream and it made me feel better about some things that trouble me so rather than lay in bed and chew on those I decided to get up and write it down fast before I forgot it or thought too much about it and "polemicized" it (made up word). It's a poem and not that polished.

I live a long way in distance and polemics from the hills of Massachusetts and my experience of it is limited to one wonderful weekend there for a concert Arlo and his family gave. For different reasons such as his having an accident and the family quickly adapting to his performance the next night, I got to see how these folks hang together in good times or bad. It became for me the example of how family, friends and shared or even discordant beliefs can work to make life better.

If that is hippie heaven, that's good. As ADG says, bring your own God.

maybe better still, bring your own self and leave the old crutch outside.

this messed up world of ours could do with ......making more love and a lot less bloody war and strife. (Probably goes for what takes place in most of our wee heads some of the time, if not all)

I admit to preferring bonobo negotiations over chimp resolutions. We are a weird monkey tree where we glorify war and sell sex but get all huffy about a web site that promotes affairs and then pour over the published lists to see how many people we know on it. It's going to be a good year for divorce lawyers here in Alabama. On the other hand, gigs for musicians may pick up in the brew pubs. Ah the blues.

That was really good. I can't write anything that rhymes to save myself and dreams disappear before I can remember them, it seems. Every once in a while, I have a particularly vivid one that I remember for hours and hours but most of it disappears, other than just a short bit.

Hippy heaven - yea, sounds good to me!

And there was me thinking you were on about some kind of 'Hippie Heaven' without the ape stuff. There is no utopia in this life (as most probably have now realised, including the hippies of old) But rather than speculate on some Utopia/heaven out there in the ether for the 'good' folks of the elect I'd prefer a hippie heaven right here on earth (along with the blues and Arlo nuts)
Maybe Hippie Heaven is just a state of mind, a hug, a glimpse of what could have been in someone's smile or helping had. You can take the human out of the ape but not the ape out of humanity. I like to think that there are many more good people out there than the nuts who promote and wage war in some wee god's name. (weak sort of god!)

Anyway Len, as i said, enjoyed the poem and am one for a wee Hippy Heaven among those who could imagine same and maybe even put it into practice. (with or without affairs of the heart and divorce lawyers!)

Cool!

I think that is how it works, Woodstock. It isn't out there. It is in here and around here. I enjoy the monkey tree. I simply think it weird. Weird is not bad. It's just .... weird.

I don't if it's because I am a musician or because I've supported that working for the Man all these years in different greenhouses, but I've had to learn best laid plans, best planned lays, all my linear thinking never work out as layed out. And it would be boring if they did. So to quote the old saw, "a wailing song and a good guitar are the only things that I understand." A little good put in different gardens does seem to bring about a better spring than a winter spent clocking rocks together.

Maybe if this day gig comes through, I'll get to go see the Folkslinger and His Precious Offspring this month. Maybe not but somewhere out there on the road, he is putting little bits of good in the ground and the monkeys here there and about say woohoo!

Hi Cheryl!

Howdy! Awaiting 4 Arlo shows in VA next yr.