.
The wife and I separated.
Why?...well just say because —
And today I got the letter
My boy wrote to Santa Claus.

It read:
Dear Santa, bring home my Daddy
On this Christmas day.
Mommy has never quit crying
Since Daddy went away.

This Christmas forget the presents
I don't want any toys.
Santa, I just want a daddy
Like other girls and boys.

Well,
I guess you know I've been naughty.
Don't know why I can't be good,
But Santa if you'll bring my Daddy
I promise I'll act like I should.

Dear Santa,
On Christmas morning,
When I run to see the tree,
There with his arm around Mommy
Please have Daddy waiting for me.

I cried as I read that letter
And I knew...
I knew that I had done wrong.
So I'm going home this Christmas
'Cause home is where I belong.

Dear Santa,
Now don't you worry
I'll be beside that tree,
And I'll have my arm around Mommy
When my boy comes looking for me.
+++
,

.........AFTERWORD — This is my traditional leading into Christmas posting.
.........In one of my former lives I was a blatant hustler in the pop-music biz, a royalty driven song-plugging lyricist working for Warner Brothers Records. I worked with two musicians. Buel Moore took care of the Rhythm & Blues side of things, while Jody McCauley wrote the melodies for my Country & Western lyrics.
......... On one of our song plugging trips south to Hollywood, Jody and I stopped in at greasy-spoon roadside diner for breakfast. In those days diners had small slot outlets to the main jukebox at every table. After we ordered, I noticed this truck driver sitting at the counter eating waffles and playing the same sad country song over and over. "Give My Love to Rose" had the rube openly bawling uncontrollably, the tears running down his cheeks — splashing into the syrup.
..........As we left the diner and headed for the car I laughed and told Jody that I'd give my eye teeth to write something sad enough to make big strong men weep into their waffles. What a feeling of power that must be!! "Get ready," I said, "because this spoiled private school, country club kid, this great pretender, is about to write the most sloppily sentimental Country Western lyric ever written." I wrote the song and Jody put a melody to it. Warner Bros. brought it out before Christmas that year as a 45 rpm single with a new Country Western singer named Warren Smith. And me? I cried all the way to the bank. .
.........I used to call this song lyric an F- poem when lecturing students about writing. It got an F- because it had nothing to do with me. My parents never got divorced -- I was born in Carmel, California with a silver spoon in my mouth. This was in the 1950s and at that time I had never even been to the South West. I was only a clever rip-off artist — a good mimic. I could listen to black music on the radio and copy the style and the way the lyrics were written. It was Buel Moore's music that gave the song authenticity. The same thing with Jody, who was born in Oklahoma played steel guitar; he made my country lyrics ring true.
.........One day around this time of the year, I was asked to do a radio interview and the show's host asked me if I had anything about Christmas to share. Do I dare? I thought to myself. I had long since given up writing for money and as a poet I used “Dear Santa” only to illustrate that sort of work, and to ridicule myself. So on a lark I decided to read the thing, pointing out what a phony I had once been. Going for the laughs, I told the waffle story, gleefully setting up the reading with much tongue-in-cheek.
.........A week or so later I got a letter from a listener that day who wanted to thank me for reading “Dear Santa.” He told me he had lost his only son in WWII and yet for some reason had never shed a single tear. He then thanked me for pulling the cork with that song, releasing thirty years of pent up tears. Since then, when I talk about honesty and writing, I am careful not to make fun and laugh at what someone else might find moving, even if I was the one who wrote it.
.........May I take this opportunity to wish all the members of my WORDS & ONE-LINER Cybergation a very hippie dippy holly daze!!

ANOUNCEMENT!

..........A biography of my life has just been completed by Steve Edington who has written two books about Jack Kerouac so I am in good company. Didn't even have to die before I was written about and I got to correct any inaccuracies. Steve has used a lot of my poetry all through the book and the FOREWORD was written by the actress Ruby Dee an old friend of mine. If interested in my life and ministry —