FINGERNAILS

Fingernails scratch the paper,
They point at a blank page.
A voice says, "Write something!"
So, he writes: "Fingernails
scratch the paper,
They point to a blank page."
#468
1974

-- Copyright © 1974, 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved. Photos and content may not be used for commercial purposes without written permission.
First published in DAYS YOU KNEW ME.
Written overlooking the baseball fields in Brookdale Park, Montclair/Bloomfield, N.J.

ONE TRUE LOVE

ONE TRUE LOVE

Did you spend the last fifty years with her
in the morning kitchen worrying together
through evening bouts of doubt
Are the children safe?
The grand kids okay?
Will the K-car start tomorrow?
Can we afford to fix it if it won’t?
What’s on cable TV tonight?
Is your dog getting enough cheese?

Did your one true love leave you
looking like a frigging penguin
standing alone outside the prom hall
with that stupid look on your face?

What about those wild nights
and the long rides
and the long talks?
Where did those endless roads lead?
But for your one true love to someone else
and you shifting through an empty cupboard.

Have you carried around your broken heart
crushed so long ago by your one true love
or have you mended and moved on
to find the one other person in this world
who could love you this much?

Do the stitches in your mended heart still sting?
Do they twitter and twitch with reminded regrets
on those days when nothing will go your way
and you long for the one true love who got away,
forgetting for an instant the one who holds your hand?

- By Anthony Buccino
From AMERICAN BOY: Pushing Sixty

On Kindle

Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino
Photo and content may not be used for commercial purposes without written permission.

WHAT'S IT LIKE TO BE

What’s it like to be
Married to different people
At different times, of course,
But how is it different?
Do you spend a lot of time
Comparing this one with that one?
Do you try not to repeat mistakes
That you’ve learned?
What is it like
Each day to be with
Somebody who is
Different than the one
You thought you’d spend
The rest of your days with?

- By Anthony Buccino
From AMERICAN BOY: Pushing Sixty
On Kindle
Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved.

FIRST KISS

No wonder he had to steal a kiss! (1970)

My first kiss came on a cold November night,
A Saturday after Thanksgiving in a stranger’s church.

My first kiss was a surprise, not for me,
I’d been thinking about it all night.
But she was surprised when she tried
to shake my hand in peace I charged in
and stole that kiss.

Her light blue eyes – I am still remembering
And the round cheeks of her smiling face
That Saturday I kissed her.
It was the only time.
On Monday we headed back to Jersey
And I never saw her again.

- By Anthony Buccino
From AMERICAN BOY: Pushing Sixty

On Kindle

Remembering November 1970

Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved. Photos and content may not be used for commercial purposes without written permission.

AQUARIUM

AQUARIUM

Somehow it seemed
I got everything I wanted.
I wanted a German shepherd,
I got a mutt named Butch.

I wanted an aquarium
just like my friend Rich had.
His had guppies and swordfish
and neon tetras, catfish and snails, too.

I wanted an aquarium
and the fish and the purple gravel
and the lighted lid and aerator pump
and the wrought iron stand
that went with it all.

I wanted to set up the pump
that made the bubbles
come out of the diver's mask.

Dad said no to the fish tank
and Ma said I'd pay for it myself
and Dad said, in his best dad voice,
"That's not the point."
He never said what the point was.

My aquarium had angel hair in the filter
and fish down below a floating wooden block
the turtles sat on after I fed them baloney
in the water, or until they got soft and died.

On the bottom, in the gravel
I set up Dad’s shells from the Fijis.
Rich and I kept Grant's pet department
going and made fun of the old lady
who sold plecostomus catfish.

My guppies all ate their babies
and the other fish got ich.

I kept that aquarium through
my teen years and then
set it up again in my house.

But lately it's been in the attic
for how many years, who knows?
I know now I never knew
what I wanted
and I still don't.

- By Anthony Buccino
from SIXTEEN INCHES ON CENTER

Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved. Photos and content may not be used for commercial purposes without written permission.

DON’T TRUST MYSELF

DON’T TRUST MYSELF

I don’t trust myself
to be here years from now
When it’s time to retire,
kick off my shoes, and
Slip into that coma of retirement.

It’s a matter of all those things
that came before
Finally coming around

to get their due
And collect the toll to pay
that appears too large.

I don’t trust myself to change
the few things left to change
That would make up for decades past
in the few decades to come
And alter the visions
the soothsayer’s seen.

-- Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved. Photos and content may not be used for commercial purposes without written permission.

PALS

PALS

In the middle of the night
the TV lights the room
he snores in the recliner
the big dog alongside him
snores almost in unison.
The TV show neither one sees
and neither one hears,
a movie repeated from before
when they fell asleep
at the early edge of night.

-- Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved. Photos and content may not be used for commercial purposes without written permission.

******************

ALL THE BEST FOODS

ALL THE BEST FOODS

Turns out the little pills
they assign you every day
that fix your cholesterol
and manage your sugar
and keep your blood steady
and fix a bunch of things
that won't fix themselves
and as you take that
handful of meds
you are reminded
to drink more water
because water is good for you
but not too much water, you know,
you have a separate pill for that
And remember those pills
you take by the handful
some work best on an empty stomach
and some work best
after you've eaten a meal
but with all of them you'll find
the foods you ate all your life
and all your favorites
are the foods you can no longer have
and this will help you live longer
thanks, what ever for?

- By Anthony Buccino
From AMERICAN BOY: Pushing Sixty

On Kindle

The poem was first published in RATTLESNAKE REVIEW 12/2007

Copyright © 2007, 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved. Photos and content may not be used for commercial purposes without written permission.

Photo from Ripley's Believe It Or Not Museum, NYC, by Anthony Buccino
******************

ADVICE

Now, Sam, did you really think
That you could step out of mediocrity
And step into the love of your life?

You didn’t think you could do it
Without having lost once or twice
And you can’t keep love alive without
Working and struggling at it.

If you thought it was so simple
Now, you know it’s not
And the loss of your most sacred lover
Will pass as others come before you.

Remember now as you encounter lovers
It’s not just a ‘give-me’ gig

If you don’t want it to work
Don’t bother to look, but if you want
To succeed, keep looking, keep working.

When love is right for you, you’ll know
The feeling – though you’ve only felt it
Once before.

If love starts to walk away
Go after it, man, follow it,
Don't let it get away.

- Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved. Photos and content may not be used for commercial purposes without written permission.

Photo, The Kiss 2, by Anthony Buccino, taken at the Hyatt in Jersey City, NJ. These two youngsters were at it for quite a while ... as the next shot in the series will show later this week. 

Alternate ending:

If love starts to walk away
Follow it to the end of the earth
Where new love is old love renewed.

******************

PIPELINE CREEK

Belleville, N.J.

We played our games and looked under rocks
Alongside the creek where the water bubbled up
Through a sandy swirl of a drainage ditch
On the low side of the underground water pipeline
Where it crosses under buzzing power lines overhead
On the hottest days of our Jersey season of steam
We always found water flowing, always enough
To soak our summer sneakers and run through a while
With squishing feet through the paths we trod.

We filled our plastic Army canteens
with fresh sparkling water In that hidden rut
of the overgrown field when we played war
and flopped dead in tall grasses.
We doused our temples and wrists with the cool water
We were sure flowed from secret streams
In Iceland to our dead-end field in northern Jersey.

No fish ever swirled in our little creek.
Maybe a turtle or frog showed up
but I don’t remember that detail any more.
The creek was still bubbling the purest water
when I moved away in 1964
but the last time I stopped by the open field of my youth,
the place where the spring had sprung was dry as could be
in the passing years the grown-ups came along
and fixed the pipeline leak.

-- Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved.
Photos and content may not be used for commercial purposes without written permission.
A Belleville poem
******************
See also Greetings From Belleville, New Jersey

ON MY SHOES

Pompeii, Italy

Horses pulled carts down these ancient streets
Rocks and trenches, uncovered now
After centuries of mystical curses
There you see the woodless rooms
On these dusty roadways so old
It rained a torrent in the streets of Pompeii
Here, in the middle of narrow streets
You see stepping stones to cross in floods
And troughs centuries old that wagons rode
Yet the brothel mosaics are almost fresh
After ages of heat and dust on this old mountainside
Long gone is the rumored second floor.
Once this was a kitchen, that a bedroom.
These shelled out, roofless rock caves
Where glassless windows grasped the slightest breeze.
This was Pompeii, in Campania, Italy,
The rich sea brought sailors and good times and riches
Until everything perished under stinging soot.
Under the recreated mummified remains
The dusty brown hound sleeps and dreams of what?
Does he see the ghosts of this terrible nightmare?
Or does he dream doggy dreams of strangers with food?
Hours later we entered Roma weary from our travels
Walk past foreign graffiti into the high class hotel
On my black shoes, the dust of Pompeii

-- Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved. Photos and content may not be used for commercial purposes without written permission.

******************
Sometimes I Swear In Italian by Anthony Buccino
in print and on Kindle

TWO PAYCHECKS

Once, you laughed at her rag picker's frumpy clothes,
and her stringy, dirty hair,
but now, you see,
you're just two paychecks away.

I never thought you would be so snooty
like you have forgotten where it is you started
your clothes were always clean.
your hair washed and brushed
and a roof always overhead.

But now, you see, you're just like her and me,
just two paychecks away from a cardboard box.

- By Anthony Buccino
From CANNED - Booted, bumped, down-sized, fired, forced out, hated, hired, jobless, laid off, let go, out of work, out-sourced, pink-slipped, terminated, sacked, unemployed

Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, content may not be used for commercial purposes without written permission.


******************

TRAVELS

TRAVELS

I want to go somewhere where I can see
without my glasses the faces of strangers
the lines in their faces the wrinkles on their trousers
the pleats in their skirts

I want to go somewhere where the headlights
don’t blind me till I cry the ground lights
don’t sneak up from my shoes
or the flood lights flood over me with light

I want to go some where
Where I can see in the dark

- By Anthony Buccino
From ONE MORNING IN JERSEY CITY

Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved. Photos and content may not be used for commercial purposes without written permission.

******************

HAND CAR

HANDCAR

I always wanted to drive one of those
special trucks that also ride on
railroad tracks.
You don’t have to steer much, accelerate and brake is all.
I guess they use them for maintenance work.
They ride the tracks on those metal wheels that real trains have.

I’ve even thought of operating one of those
see-saw cars where you pump the handle
and it goes on the railroad tracks.
You used to see them a lot in old movies,
mostly Westerns, the see-saw carts, I mean.
I guess they come in handy
in mines and Indiana Jones
movies, not to mention
Blazing Saddles when
you’re building a railroad.

Who knew before this poem
there are societies for the
preservation of the handcar,
pump car, jigger, Kalamazoo?
Or that the cart in my pipedream
had a name or two.
We can all thank the mighty
Internet for bringing
pieces of history and fact
into my daydream.

- By Anthony Buccino
From VOICES ON THE BUS

Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved. Photos and content may not be used for commercial purposes without written permission.

First published in Medusa's Kitchen

YOUR BIRTHDAY

YOUR BIRTHDAY
Jersey City, NJ

In honor of your birthday
I fed the pigeons on the pier.
A few showed up, then a few more.

Seagulls arrive to watch from a distance
Squawk for their friends to join the scrim
For pieces of bread I've cast off for them
Into the Hudson River shallows

But mostly today,
in honor of your birthday
I fed the pigeons
on the pier.

- By Anthony Buccino
from SIXTEEN INCHES ON CENTER

For my dad, the proud pigeon flyer.
Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved.

WORKING FATHER

He's so old and worn,

been through a lot since he was born

Works hard everyday

to put food in our mouths

so we don't have to pay

Tries to love us but can't,

begins to show us,

he's proud, but can't

Been in a war,fighting and sick,

he's lived through four

He coughs and gags

from years of choking his smokes,

we pretend not to hear,

His shirt is dull and torn,

from nails and rails,

and he's old and worn

-- Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved.

PREACHER MAN

H is for almost home!
Down three flights of stairs to the NCS Light Rail.
A car is pulling in. I grab a seat and then see him.
“Brudders and sisters,” the Preacher Man says,
“I am here to tell you the news about heaven …”
He always waits until the car pulls
out of the station before he begins.
“I used to smoke, cheat, steal … Jesus gave me a new …”
You figure it isn’t easy to preach
the word to these bones,
these bones that ride these rails.
The ones who hear him won’t give him
the time of day, so to speak.
The heavenly choir riding
that peace train home
is tuning out the song.
“Jesus came into this world to seek
and to save that which was lost …”
On my fractured CD player,
Marty Robbins sings in my ear.
Yes. El Paso. One of the songs I can’t hear
is about the bad cowboy saved while rustling cattle.
In the song lightning stampedes the herd
and a strike splits a tree into the shape of a cross
and the bad cowboy sees it and is saved from his evil ways.
Kind of reminds me of that Sgt. York movie
when lightning shatters the rifle Alvin is carrying.
Norfolk Street and the Preacher Man’s still going.
I’ve been running in to him for about four years.
A lot of good it did me, eh?
The walking dead are trying to tune him out.

In desperation to get his baritone droning
out of their heads they read the ads posted overhead.
It doesn’t matter that they are written in Spanish
“Su Dinero Cuando Usted Lo Necesita” – make
funny sentences by mixing up the the foreign words.
This must be the 20th time
“from out of nowhere Felina has found me.”
You remember, of course, that I got the CD player to play
more or less – in one ear, depending
on a jostle here and there.
But it’s only playing one song over and over
and I can’t reach down to get it out of my pocket to re-set it.
Here goes the “handsome young
stranger lay dead on the floor.”
My fingers have given up and I’m writing in a fist.
You could wonder – but my hand is asleep
when I need it most.
Preacher Man got off at Bloomfield Avenue.
I hear a lot of buses pass that way.
Our car rattles on to Davenport Avenue
and Branch Brook Station.
Two more modes of transportation,
“then Felina good-bye.”

-- Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved. Photos and content may not be used for commercial purposes without written permission.

From Voices On The Bus, train subway, sidewalk and in my head

VALIUM BREEZE

VALIUM BREEZE

On a breezy day in the northwest corner
of our town you could smell
the vitamins cooking across the road.
Nowadays you see the modern buildings,
sky high and full of workers.

But a hundred years ago
in that very same clearing, the circus
settled in and dear Miss Annie Oakley
came to town by train and practiced
shooting in the pre-Valium breeze.
And they named a nearby street after her

Not too long ago, though,
we didn’t need the Valley of the Dolls
all we had to do was breathe
and we’d either get our
recommended daily supply
of 12 wonder vitamins
or a buzz so loud
we’d duck the invisible bees.

But nowadays, kid, it’s all changed.
The baffles clean the air before
it leaves the chimney
and the smokestack, they say,
is so clean you could eat off it.

- By Anthony Buccino
From YOUNTAKAH COUNTRY A Poetic View Of Nutley Old And New

Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved. Photos and content may not be used for commercial purposes without written permission.
******************

INDIAN TRADERS

INDIAN TRADERS

Just a few hundred years ago
in the thick green undergrowth
where the Yanticaw Creek
meets the wide old Passaic River
the fish surrendered by jumping
into hollowed dugout canoes.

From the banks of Delawanna
to the overhang at Brookdale Park
wampum changed hands
in peace and prosperity for generations.

The people, the True People, Lenni Lenape,
celebrated the yantacaw,
a thanksgiving feast – long before
the other people called Pilgrims
celebrated – a bountiful feast
with like people from up north
who brought exotic furs and canoes
and traded with southern natives
for salt fish and seashells.

- By Anthony Buccino
From YOUNTAKAH COUNTRY A Poetic View Of Nutley Old And New
Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved. Photos and content may not be used for commercial purposes without written permission.
******************

OLD MAN

OLD MAN

How patient you were as you watched me play with my plastic men on the carpet strewn
with dead soldiers, scattered toy guns and tanks.
The explosion noises I made with my child’s mouth were some ironic twist to your fate.
For here you were, spending your lifetime to forget what your son innocently brings up again in your face.
After all this time I realize I spent my time trying to be you.
And you, you spent your time trying to forget what you’d been through.
I’m sorry if I ever hurt you, Dad,you know it wasn’t like that.
I was just a blond-haired kid doing what little boys do.

- By Anthony Buccino
from SIXTEEN INCHES ON CENTER
Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved.
Old Man first published in Raving Dove Online Literary Magazine
******************

BAD BOYS

BAD BOYS

We had tough guys in my neighborhood.
They were always angling for a fight.
They were the first guys in the trouble du jour.
When we got caught the cops gave us a rap
Then when we got home Pop whooped us good.
But with some tough guys it never sank in.
They tried the next worse thing and then the next, too.
After so much trouble they got to go in the Army
and fight in the jungle.
Maybe they'd get it out of their system. Or not.

- Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved.
From AMERICAN BOY: Pushing Sixty

WHAT PA DIDN’T SAY

WHAT PA DIDN’T SAY

Dad was never much of a talker a few words here and there

a short story in an economy of words about the adventures of one of his homers
Dad was never much of a writer 

He never left a note to say he was running out for breakfast
or would be back in a little while so it was a great surprise for all
when some of his Guadalcanal letters appeared more than twenty years
after he passed away we met my father as a young man we never knew

His long forgotten letters to his buddy back home showed a man who misses his family and the long years he was overseas as censors cut out little holes the Japs would never see

He wrote of something he saw but will never forget and never said what it was
but it was what silenced him for all those years we knew him.

- By Anthony Buccino
from SIXTEEN INCHES ON CENTER
Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved.

WAR MOVIES

War Movies

The louder the better it always seemed. No matter.
He always fell asleep before John Wayne won the war
or the sad dog whimpered at the cavalryman’s fate.

Who knew what he knew?
He never said anything except to mention malaria
and those old photos we found of native women in grass skirts.
But that was such a small part of the things he carried inside.

It wasn’t jolly, or fun.
It wasn’t something you could say.
The best you could do was build something new.
And when you’ve exhausted your body as much as your soul
turn on an old war movie and sleep through this TV play
as you dream of the past war and remember noises
no orchestra could drown.

- By Anthony Buccino
from SIXTEEN INCHES ON CENTER
Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved.

OVERALLS

OVERALLS

People laugh at the Li’l Abner look where the tops of my shitkickers
have a large gap to the bottom of my pin-striped bib overalls.
Don’t the stripes make me look taller?
It’s not the effect you see in these overalls.
I wear them because they are functional,
made of tough material, and have lots of pockets
and a twisted loop for my 16-oz. Stanley hammer.

Your pockets can get full of Sheetrock bits
and you won’t get into any kind of laundry trouble.
I’ve worn through a lot of solid blue bib overalls, myself.
Dad used to get me them at a great price at a little store
called Walensky’s on Bloomfield Avenue in Montclair.
Maybe that’s where he got this pair?
This pair of white overalls has blue vertical stripes.
I had two pairs like this once, but one plumb wore out.
These bibs fit Dad to a T you can bet.
His legs were shorter than mine,
and his belly, well, that’s another story.
I don’t want another pair for Christmas or my birthday.
This pair I save for special working occasions
like heavy yard work, or painting something.
I’m trying to make these engineer overalls last forever


- By Anthony Buccino
from SIXTEEN INCHES ON CENTER
Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved.
******************

AFTERMATH

Don't come to me when you're not feeling well

Don't come to me or make me tell

You how I wish I could heal every bone
you call your own
And don't ask me to cleanse your soul

After this, only time can make you whole

You're leaving here And you're going
To meet your husband Who gave you your child

And all the while That I held your hand

You still wore his golden band

Your leaving now is the end

But I'll always say you were my friend

Pack your bags and get

Leave here before your cheeks get wet

Leave your brother here before I don't let

You pack your bags and get

-- Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved.
On going back to Ashtabula

PUNCH LINE

PUNCH LINE

She thinks she's dyin

But I know she won't

I'm asking why'n

She's sayin don't

I don't wanna have a baby, mama,
I don't wanna die

I don't wanna be a mother, mama,
I don't wanna cry

I don't wanna be a wife, mama,
I don't wanna lie

I don't wanna have a baby, mama,
I don't wanna die

-- Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved.
On her miscarriage.
******************

POEM FOR CHILDHOOD

POEM FOR CHILDHOOD

For Dennis

Never a boot in the ass from these shoes

Nor a stomp on an instep to wield a crippling ballyhoo

No kicks to the groins or knuckles to the jaw

Just a slowly moving mind recording what it saw

He was a youngster like me

In the days before we had to worry

About loading real bullets into real guns

And we never had any carnage to bury

Skinny with a long bony face

His mind’s speed about he same as mine

We shared our youth and school uniforms

Where we met and fooled killin’ nothing but time

The last I remember of our days of play

We went home after school one afternoon

He asked his ma where the dog had gone

Without no warning she took a gun to it – kabloom!

Denny started bawlin’ and didn’t want to play

Any kinds of games with me after that

Blamed me, and I felt a strange sadness

I walked home quickly with my eyes behind my hat

-- Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved.
(Actually, his mother got rid of the dog 
while the kids were at school, but she didn't kill it.)
******************

TURPS

TURPS

When girls say turps for turpentine
It rubs me the wrong way.
I’m jealous they had it better
With their fathers than I did with mine.
Their fathers shared the lingo
Turps for turpentine.
Shortcuts for washing
A soaked paint brush.
Girls who learned to hammer
And built things with their dads
And climbed ladders to rooftops
And snapped the blue plumb line for dad
It rubs me the wrong way.
They did boy things with dad
And dad passed along how tos.
And forever their little girls
Spend a lifetime now saying
Turps for turpentine.

- By Anthony Buccino
from SIXTEEN INCHES ON CENTER

Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved.
Turps first published in The Idiom
******************

TO MARIE

There you are, smiling, your jackhammer arms resting across the barrel of your cannon.
The chalk mark names the woman you love to “Marie Lovely” from the jungle on Guadalcanal.

You decided to wait til you got back to marry
the skinny girl you met at the roller rink.
Some of the guys you’re serving with didn’t.
You’re sure, right now, you made the right choice.

To "Marie”, her name in chalk
on the barrel of a killing machine.
What would she say
when she sees this picture?

Is she glad you’re thinking of her, that you’ll kill the  enemy in her name?
Or will she be so happy to have you home again this photo will not matter?

-- Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved.
Photos and content may not be used for commercial purposes without written permission.

RIP, Marie.
Twenty years, and it still seems like yesterday.
There's so much to tell you, I know you are still listening.
******************

AND A BOHEMIAN HAT

AND A BOHEMIAN HAT

If I really wanted
to be a poet

I’d have gotten out
new sunglasses

And a Bohemian hat

I’ve already got
the mumbling down pat

And some old clothes
in a trunk for the street-wise

Oh what a poet
I’d have made

With just a little education
and a louder mouth

I could put
them all to shame

If I knew
what I was doing

I would-a done it
when I came

-- Copyright © 2010 by Anthony Buccino, all rights reserved.
******************