Friday, December 18, 2015

James Babbs- Three Poems



James Babbs continues to live and write from the same small Illinois town where he grew up.  He has published hundreds of poems over the past thirty years and, recently, a few short stories.  James is the author of Disturbing The Light(2013) & The Weight of Invisible Things(2013).


Bolinas

someday
I hope to make it
all the way to California
maybe
I’ll stay there forever
and never come back again
every day
I’ll stroll along the beach
watching the tide roll in
I’ll feel the warmth of the sun
and push my toes into the sand
and on the weekends
I’ll drive up to Bolinas
to meet the ghost of Richard Brautigan
I’ll let him read some of my poems
I’ll take him out to dinner
and we’ll have a few drinks
we’ll sit around the bar
laughing for no reason
telling each other awful trout jokes
the worse they are the better
and we’ll both get really drunk
and stagger around town
disturbing all the peace
and during some quiet interlude
I’ll ask him
what it’s like being dead
and Richard will lean back
and tell me
it’s like being put on hold
when you’re talking on the phone
but instead of hearing music
you hear all the sounds
from each day of your life
then
I’ll challenge him
to a mercury loading contest
we’ll take up our pitchforks
and start loading our trucks
and a crowd will slowly
start gathering around us
they’ll stand around
watching


Torn Apart

I drove away from her house
away from the sun
sinking in the sky
I left it all behind and
headed down the road
I drove away
knowing
I’d never see her again
I saw her
standing in the doorway
waiting for me to leave
the vultures ahead of me
tearing at some dead thing
the vultures rising into the air
circling around
when I drove past
the dead thing on the road
so torn apart
it was unrecognizable
now


I Wanted to Write This

I wanted to write this
while watching TV
I wanted to hear voices
other than my own and
I wanted a place
different from this one
where things happen
because
nothing ever happens here
and I have my nights
the same as my days
except one of them’s
covered with darkness and
I have dreams
that keep repeating themselves
dreams without endings
and I have too much time
but I understand
I won’t live forever
too many things
I can’t stop thinking about


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