August 2015
I am a retired business-to-business PR and publishing professional residing in northern New Jersey with my wife and son and a shrinking menagerie of merry pets. I began writing poetry (not very well) 100 years ago as an undergraduate at Georgetown University, where I earned bachelor's and master's degrees in English Literature. My poems have appeared recently in Contemporary American Voices (I was the Featured Poet in the January 2015 issue), the Wilderness House Literary Review, Blue Monday Review, and Atavic Poetry. In 2013, I celebrated (mostly by smiling a lot) the publication of my first poetry chapbook, What Comes Next, by Finishing Line Press. A lifelong Giants fan (New York and San Francisco), I still can't believe I lived long enough to see them win three World Series in five years. If you'd like to see more of my work, please click on http://www.whlreview.com/no-9.4/poetry/JamesKeane.pdf.
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Editor's Note: After I asked him to contribute to the August issue of V-V, Jim sent these two lovely poems and a recent photograph of his wife, Barbara Jean, and him together (see the happy couple below). Jim wrote:
As it happens, August 4th will mark our 31st wedding anniversary. "This Ring of Ours," written to celebrate our fourth anniversary in 1988, was inspired simply by my pulling my wedding ring on and off while I was trying to come up with a poem (I was thinner then). "Bless" was completed 26 years later, in November 2014. I read the poem this past March at the 16th Annual St. Catherine of Bologna Photography, Art and Poetry exhibition in Ringwood, New Jersey. In my introduction, I noted that our 31st wedding anniversary was coming in August, and that it seemed only fair after all these years to write a poem to my wife Barbara Jean acknowledging that I haven't been the easiest guy to live with. It was the least I could do. |
Aw... -FF
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This Ring of Ours
that I wear everywhere could slip from my finger at the slightest pull. What keeps it in place is my love for you. May love ever brighten your face. Your love for me I wear everywhere for everyone to see. May it radiate from me at the slightest pull. May it stay forever in place, embraced everywhere by my love for you. And anchored in love for as long as we live with this ring of ours. Bless the home this house becomes when brightened by your love to withstand the darkness only my eyes, grown frightened, can hold against your wishes. Bless all trees and bushes gracing the home this house becomes when tended with your love to withstand love’s erosion only my anger, grown distended, can mold against your wishes. Bless your heart’s flowing warming the home this house becomes when paned by your love to withstand love’s slowing only my heart, grown self-contained, can uphold against your wishes. Above all, bless your soul’s knowing, no stranger to the danger of my anger. Brace the home this house has become. Sprung by your love to withstand the death of my soul’s growing, knowing no longer, should it die against our wishes. Credit: “Bless” was previously published in Contemporary American Voices. |
©2015 James Keane