[New-Poetry] All aboard!

[Anny Ballardini]

Are you asking who is the author? The best, James Finnegan.

From: "barry seiler" <barryseiler at hotmail.com>
Sent: Tuesday, August 14, 2007 9:36 PM
Subject: RE: [New-Poetry] All aboard!


> Hi--
>
> Rough fish is terrific. Who did it pass through on its way to the page?
>
> Green Windows
>
> This is the fable of our daily going,
> This riding westward to Newark,
> Sun behind us flashback red,
>
> Before us green windows
> Flashing above the Passaic,
> Green windows of Mutual Benefit Life.
>
> In my had I hear the Talking Heads,
> Al Green's Take Me to the River.
> In the shrunken world everything fits.
>
> Two rows ahead, the one-eyed
> Small claims adjuster
> Curses the delays. He leans back
>
> Closing his one good eye
> And dreams of not deboarding on Broad Street
> But following the tracks
>
> Beyond the Oranges, Short Hills, Summit.
> Or he dreams he is rising
> And floating out of the green windows,
>
> Watching them blazing behind him,
> Red and green, and red again,
> Like the burning of the frail craft
>
> Of Cortez on the coast of Mexico.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>>From: "Skip Fox" <skip at louisiana.edu>
>>Reply-To: "NewPoetry: Contemporary Poetry News &amp;Views" 
>><new-poetry at wiz.cath.vt.edu>
>>To: "'NewPoetry: Contemporary Poetry News &amp;Views'" 
>><new-poetry at wiz.cath.vt.edu>
>>Subject: RE: [New-Poetry] All aboard!
>>Date: Tue, 14 Aug 2007 14:17:39 -0500
>>
>>I'm betting Sherwood Anderson would really like this poem. (As I do.)
>>
>>
>>
>>-----Original Message-----
>>From: new-poetry-bounces at wiz.cath.vt.edu
>>[mailto:new-poetry-bounces at wiz.cath.vt.edu] On Behalf Of jforjames at aol.com
>>Sent: Tuesday, August 14, 2007 1:48 PM
>>To: new-poetry at wiz.cath.vt.edu
>>Subject: Re: [New-Poetry] All aboard!
>>
>>
>>
>>Rough Fish
>>
>>
>>Under the creosote and rust of a railway trestle,
>>three older boys fish for carp. They finish off
>>a few cans of beer that one of them snuck out
>>of the house, not worried about getting caught,
>>because his dad will just think he drank it all last night
>>and go buy some more. The only line
>>in the water was nibbled clean hours ago,
>>but no one pulls it up and checks it. The bait
>>smells bad, a stink not easy to wash from your hands.
>>This isn't exactly fishing, it's about getting out
>>of those sweat-box shotgun houses
>>that line the depot road, and lying back in the high weeds
>>where it's cool down along the riverbank. Besides,
>>the fish really aren't good for eating, full of bones
>>and hard to clean, and the heavy metals
>>in these waters seem to have made their scales
>>thick as hammered armorplate. Some say these rough fish
>>grow big as the wrecked Buicks and Dodges
>>that you can half-see, submerged, lying off the shallows.
>>One of the boys will finish highschool
>>and work till he retires at the refinery,
>>one will steal cars and do a short stretch
>>before he marries a girl who gets him righted,
>>one will get hit by a train, having passed out
>>unaware of the moonlight shining on the tops of the rails,
>>the burnished steel indicating a well-used spur of track.
>>For now their life is this one long afternoon, a summer
>>without work and a circle of butts on the ground
>>like hour marks on a clock of dirt,
>>their prospects thin as a lottery ticket
>>left in the back pocket of someone's cutoffs,
>>a slip of paper and maybe the winning numbers
>>melting away when one them gets too hot
>>and says he's going in for a swim.
>>
>>
>>
>>--
>>