April 2016
James Keane
jkeanenj@optonline.net
jkeanenj@optonline.net
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.
Editor's Note: In his submission letter, Jim wrote this: ""Babes" (which is what I call my wife) was inspired by my too-often morose musings while riding a commuter bus to New York City, which I did for 15 years. If there was any lesson to be learned, it is this: when riding a commuter bus for a significant length of time, your best options are to read or sleep. Just don't try to think."
Babes
I’ve been writing and speaking your eulogy
in my mind
again, the heart-filled-with-
aching speech of unrequited pain
again, the one where
not a day goes by that
you didn’t give me joy
but then
Darla, Alfalfa, Spanky, Sneezy, Dopey (me?) and
for all I know
Willie, Mickey, the Duke of Flatbush and of
Memory or Whimsy (me!)
tickle your smiling teeth forever to squeak
sweetly, neatly through
all the revolting yogurts
sprouts and salads of bitter lettuce
you always and eagerly chew, while
a quiet hand I never knew
two seats down more softly
than suddenly
peeks, halts
reaches wistfully
barren into the dull commuted air to
click off the hovering
light of my wayward dreams
as I stare
at everyone and everything
that isn’t all there, while barely
gripping the seat across the aisle,
abandoned newspapers rarely
contain themselves to reveal
another bright, oblivious teen-aged boy
has died
a stupid death behind a steering wheel
and
for lack of anything better to do
everyone cried.
Babes,
I will come again
and again to our own
untimely end?
having reveled
in many a stupid and lovely thing:
The kind leg
of my woman
friend rests gently
softly
on my knee
and shin, her head in innocence
nodding, heavy
with work and heavenly
songs her angelic voice would bring, slowly
sinking, unbidden?
but sinking . . . halting . . . dropping . . .
faltering . . . haltering . . . halter topping? . . . Oh,
just sing,
silent mouth,
roam about
my secret
grin, win
over and over
my suburban head grown a little
less older, a pleasure dome
of tin, then
light and nest on my stately
shoulder, at least
till we all roll home.
Originally published in Open Wide.
Babes
I’ve been writing and speaking your eulogy
in my mind
again, the heart-filled-with-
aching speech of unrequited pain
again, the one where
not a day goes by that
you didn’t give me joy
but then
Darla, Alfalfa, Spanky, Sneezy, Dopey (me?) and
for all I know
Willie, Mickey, the Duke of Flatbush and of
Memory or Whimsy (me!)
tickle your smiling teeth forever to squeak
sweetly, neatly through
all the revolting yogurts
sprouts and salads of bitter lettuce
you always and eagerly chew, while
a quiet hand I never knew
two seats down more softly
than suddenly
peeks, halts
reaches wistfully
barren into the dull commuted air to
click off the hovering
light of my wayward dreams
as I stare
at everyone and everything
that isn’t all there, while barely
gripping the seat across the aisle,
abandoned newspapers rarely
contain themselves to reveal
another bright, oblivious teen-aged boy
has died
a stupid death behind a steering wheel
and
for lack of anything better to do
everyone cried.
Babes,
I will come again
and again to our own
untimely end?
having reveled
in many a stupid and lovely thing:
The kind leg
of my woman
friend rests gently
softly
on my knee
and shin, her head in innocence
nodding, heavy
with work and heavenly
songs her angelic voice would bring, slowly
sinking, unbidden?
but sinking . . . halting . . . dropping . . .
faltering . . . haltering . . . halter topping? . . . Oh,
just sing,
silent mouth,
roam about
my secret
grin, win
over and over
my suburban head grown a little
less older, a pleasure dome
of tin, then
light and nest on my stately
shoulder, at least
till we all roll home.
Originally published in Open Wide.
©2016 James Keane