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CAUGHT IN THE NET 162 - POETRY BY JAMES BABBS
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|
I pulled a beer from the fridge before twisting off the cap and tossing it toward the
wastebasket it tumbled through the air and hit the edge of the
container it seemed to just teeter there on the brink of going in
from Something Else by James Babbs |
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CONTENTS
1 - BIOGRAPHY
2 – POETRY
My Girlfriend Gave Me This
Shirt The Time and Temperature
Lady Before The Shootings Tonight I’m Drinking Trying
to Forget You Things That Aren’t
Important Happen All the Time A Hundred Years From Now Watching the Movie Sylvia Something Else All the Poems Ran Away Black Cow |
3 - PUBLISHING HISTORY
4 - AFTERWORD
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1 – BIOGRAPHY: James Babbs
James Babbs lives in
the same small town where he grew up. He has had hundreds of poems and a
few short stories published, both, online and in print. He has been
published in This Is Poetry, Volume 2: The Midwest Poets and recently has
appeared online at In Between Hangovers and Your One Phone Call. James is
the author of Another Beautiful Night(Lulu.com, 2010), Disturbing The
Light(Interior Noise Press, 2013) and The Weight of Invisible Things(Finishing
Line Press, 2013).
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2 - POETRY
My Girlfriend Gave Me
This Shirt
my girlfriend gave me this
shirt
she’s not my girlfriend
anymore
but I’m still wearing the
shirt
because
it’s a perfectly good shirt
and
I’m not going to throw it
away
maybe some guys would do
that
but what’s the point
I mean
I’m reminded of her
whether I’m wearing the
shirt or not
so I might as well
keep wearing it and
write a poem about it and
get as much as I can from
it
because
it doesn’t really change
anything and
we’re no longer together
so wearing the shirt
or not wearing it
what the hell difference
does it make
The Time and Temperature
Lady
when I was younger
I dialed her number
late at night lying on
the bed in my room
because
I loved the sound of
her voice
the way she said
the numbers like
she was speaking
just to me and
for a long time
I thought she was
really out there somewhere
sitting alone in some glass
booth
waiting for the phone to
ring
and even after I discovered
she was only a recording
there were still nights
when I called her and
held the phone to my ear
after she’d finished hoping
if I waited long enough
her voice would come back
on
asking me
if I was okay and
did I need anything else
Before The Shootings
years before there were
school shootings
Steve took me to the school
parking lot
and showed me the gun he
kept
under the seat of his truck
let me hold it in my hand
it was heavier than I
expected
Steve said it was a three
fifty-seven magnum
capable of blowing a hole
the size of
a nickel through an engine
block
I gave it back to him
and never considered him a
threat
he put the gun back under
the seat
and we went back inside
Tonight I’m Drinking
Trying to Forget You
1.
tonight
I’m drinking
trying to forget you
the bartender
this cute blonde
with the beautiful smile
bringing me another beer
and telling me how every
night
she makes enough in tips to
pay
her utilities for the month
she loves this job
but she’s going to school
because
she wants to be a teacher
wants to work with kids
she has a son of her own
he just turned five and
looks like his father
but don’t ask her about him
she hasn’t heard anything
from him for a long time
and
she doesn’t know where he’s
at
doesn’t really care
because
he’s an asshole
and I watch the way she
moves
like a beautiful dancer
I tell her
slurring my words a little
she’ll own this place
before all’s said and done
and she throws back her
head
laughing with her eyes
closed
and I think
oh hell
there goes another five
bucks
2.
tonight
I’m drinking
trying to forget you
two guys across the bar
comparing tattoos
lifting their shirts and
turning around
so people can get a better
view
when one of them
starts taking off his pants
somebody laughs
but his wife or girlfriend
or whoever she might be
slaps him and
tells him to stop
they start talking about
their scars
the first guy saying
he got this one outside
some nightclub in Detroit
after some fat ass
mouthed off to his
girlfriend
then the chickenshit
pulled a knife on him
instead of standing there
and fighting him like a man
the second guy saying
he got this one
when he was a kid
when he ran across the yard
and fell on a rake
and had to have fourteen
stitches
and didn’t have to go to
school
for two or three days
and he laughed
talking about how mad his
brother got
because
he didn’t get to stay home
3.
tonight
I’m drinking
trying to forget you
but I keep thinking about
you
wondering where you are
what you might be doing
tonight
while two attractive women
slow dance together
to a Van Morrison song
running their hands
over each other’s body
and I see them
laughing
one of them touching
the other one’s hair
telling the bartender
I need another beer
laying my money down
before I go to take a piss
walking past the guys
with the tattoos and the
scars
wondering if I should tell
them
about my own scars
the ones hidden on the
inside
I can feel them in there
but I can’t take my shirt
off
and show them how they look
because
there’s nothing for them to
see
Things That Aren’t
Important Happen All the Time
stopping at the gas station
on my way home from work
filling up the car and
maybe while I’m here
I’ll get something to eat
they’ve got good subs
that they make themselves
so I head toward the
kitchen
the woman at the front
counter
where they keep the
cigarettes and
the lottery machine
smiles at me
when she thinks I’m not
looking
while I’m waiting for the
girl
with braces on her teeth
to finish making my
sandwich
I’m getting the classic
combo
with ham and turkey and
roast beef and
she doesn’t know Paul
Newman
she says
the face on the salad
dressing
reminds her of Maury
she says
you know
that guy with the talk show
I tell her
yeah
I know who he is
but that’s Paul Newman on
the bottle
he was an actor
I tell her
but I guess she’s too young
and
I start thinking of some of
his movies
but I’m convinced
all the ones I come up with
she’s not going to know
then I say
what about Tom Cruise and
the Color of Money
but she just frowns at me
and
shakes her pretty little
head and
I realize
even that one was made
long before she was born
A Hundred Years From Now
a hundred years from now
it won’t matter
the way I feel tonight
because
you’re not here with me
and by then this house
could be nothing more
than a hole in the ground
and roads may not look the
same
because
people will have flying
machines
instead of cars and
a hundred years from now
how many more wars
how many babies crying
a hundred years from now
will people be dying from
cancer
what will people be
watching on TV
a hundred years from now
people might be living on
the moon
gazing back at the earth
through huge glass domes
and
maybe
by that time
there will be cities on
Mars
every morning
people riding in spaceships
traversing the heavens
but, still, searching for
love
a hundred years from now
I’ll be gone
and no one will remember my
name
Watching the Movie
Sylvia
it’s about the poet Sylvia
Plath
and when she met her
husband
the poet Ted Hughes
and the relationship they
had
it stars Gwyneth Paltrow
and I really like her
I think
she’s an attractive woman
and I remember
when I started reading
Sylvia’s poetry
years ago
looking at pictures of her
I found in books
and I guess
I developed this crush on
her
this woman who killed
herself
three years before I was
born
and then
when I was watching the
movie
it felt strange seeing
Gwyneth
who was playing Sylvia
these two women merged into
the same woman on the
screen
does this sound crazy to
you
I know
I know
and there’s this one scene
near the end of the film
I keep thinking about
after Sylvia and Ted
have made love on the couch
and he tells her
he’s not coming back to her
because
his girlfriend’s pregnant
and then it’s just
Gwyneth/Sylvia
sitting naked on the couch
her legs pulled up under
her and
I stopped the movie
hit rewind
so I could look at it again
but I want to go back
and watch the whole movie
again
some time soon
catch some of the things
I missed the first time
around
maybe
pause that scene again
with Gwyneth naked
beautiful
Sylvia sitting there
so vulnerable
so alone
Something Else
after she’d been gone for a
few months
I started trying to piece
things back together
but the pieces no longer
seemed to fit each other
the way they had before
so I figured it was too
late
and I would have to try
something else
I pulled a beer from the
fridge
before twisting off the cap
and tossing it toward the
wastebasket
it tumbled through the air
and hit the edge of the
container
it seemed to just teeter
there
on the brink of going in
but only for a second
before falling on to the
floor
I took a drink of beer
then went over and picked
up the cap
and threw it in the
wastebasket
with more force than was
necessary
before taking my beer
with me into the living
room
and staring out the window
at something that wasn’t
there
All the Poems Ran Away
they just left one day
without telling me goodbye
I woke up in the morning
and knew something was
wrong
an eerie silence permeated
the room
the fractured light broken
on the floor
I scrambled out of bed
and rushed into the hall
where a quiet desperation
lingered in the air
I started going from room
to room
searching the darkest
corners for the poems
believing those were the
kinds of places
where the poems would go to
hide
but I only found a stray
word or two
scattered on the floor
one discarded line wadded
up
and thrown beneath the bed
but that was all there was
so I walked down the hall
and stood
in the middle of the living
room
and started screaming at
the walls
because
I didn’t know what else to
do
the poems were gone
and I didn’t know why
I just stood there alone
in the middle of the room
the sound of my heart
beating in my ears
Black Cow
The burnt log in the ditch
looks like a black cow
lying on its side in the
grass.
That makes me think about
the rock group Steely Dan
because
they have a song called
Black Cow
from their 1977 album
Aja.
That’s, also, the album
with
the song Deacon Blues
which is one of my personal
favorites.
By the way,
in case you didn’t know,
Steely Dan got their name
from a dildo
in the book Naked Lunch
written by William S.
Burroughs
back in the 1950s.
A black cow is a kind of
drink
and I’ve never had one
before
but when I look it up on
the internet
I know it’s not something I
would enjoy.
I’m mostly just a beer guy.
Oh,
every now and then,
I might drink some red wine
but I usually stick with
beer.
I like it in bottles
instead of cans.
I like putting the bottles
in the freezer for several
minutes
or inside a cooler buried
under ice.
So cold
it makes your hands ache
when you reach in there
after a little while
and pull out the next
bottle.
My Girlfriend Gave Me This
Shirt-Published in, Another Beautiful Night 2010
The Time and Temperature
Lady-Published by, Waterways 2007
Published in, Another Beautiful Night 2010
Before The
Shootings-Published by, My Favorite Bullet 2005
Published in, Disturbing the Light 2013
Tonight I’m Drinking
Trying to Forget You-Published by, Red Fez 2011
Published in, Disturbing the Light 2013
Things That Aren’t
Important Happen All the Time-Published by, Chiron Review 2009
Published in, Disturbing
the Light 2013
A Hundred Years From
Now-Published in, The Weight of Invisible Things 2013
Watching the Movie
Sylvia-Published in, The Weight of Invisible Things 2013
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4 - Afterword
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