Best Phone Booth Poems
LOSS
sitting on the bus
watching shops pass by
passengers reflected exit like ghosts
she’s gone
and another and another
in the park
by a phone booth
wanting to call my love
sudden shade startles me
sun behind a cloud
Dave Austin
Everybody, and his brother
Stopped in, at one time, or another
Not for the greasy hash browns
Or the coffee, with a half a cup, of grounds
They weren't there for Ruby or Ruth
Whose numbers were in the phone booth
At night when the honky tonks closed down
It was the only place open in town
The regulars sat at the back
The bar was reserved for the hacks
Nobody ever stayed very long
A blue plate special or a jukebox song
The burgers were extra greasy
Waitresses a little sleazy
But there were always people around
It was the only place open in town
My mom, warned about it's reputation
My dad, more concerned about damnation
I used to go there, from time to time
Back when a pay phone was just a dime
On occasion wound up in jail
And one might say, I've been through hell
Anything one needed could be found
It was the only place open in town
We saw the smoke, from miles away
Heard the fire trucks, early that day
Everybody not working, went to see
The roaches and the mice run free
When the honky tonks closed that night
Everybody had to go home tight
Cause before the old cafe' burnt down
It was the only place open in town
Looking back, had some good times there
Just sit by the window and stare
Reflections of places and faces
Kinda like a memory, oasis
Life was a whole lot slower
I was a wild oat sower
But anytime, one wanted, to hunker down
It was the only place open in town
by Daniel Turner
A many talks I have
a phone chats with mom and dad
Facebooking my friends
Long after dinner time
And if I really think about communication
the old fashion way
I call them upon my land-line
What's a land-line
And what ever happen to Northeastern Bell
well
that's how we talk to each other human to human
But when I wake up in the new day
I fall on my knees
and chat wit God as I pray
Oh! I fall on my knees
and have a chat wit God as I pray
What's the matter, got all this chatter on Twitter
Space chat is what's up, what is that
Does any one Email any more
And what is a phone booth
And does anyone remember Mother Goose
Facebooking my friends
Long after dinner time
And if I really think about communication
the old fashion way
I call them upon my land-line
What's a land-line
And what ever happen to Northeastern Bell
well
I Snap chat, Google and Verizon, Teen Mobile CenturyLink
All this downloading and less and or no praying
now before you fall asleep
with the phone in your hand
because your mind got over headed by all your Texting
I got a better communication
But when I wake up in the new day
I fall on my knees
and chat wit God as I pray
Oh! I fall on my knees
and have a chat wit God as I pray
But when I wake up in the new day
I fall on my knees
and chat wit God as I pray
Oh! I fall on my knees
and have a chat wit God as I pray
Anytime, every time anywhere I don't care
Stop talking space head
fall on my knees
and have a chat wit God as I pray
Dedicated to "Darlene Beaulieu"
written by James Edward Lee Sr.
11/27/17
from anthology " God's Children New poets, Poems and New Friends"
If we had a modern day Superman, he would not survive
He wouldn't be able to keep all of us alive
His identity would not be a secret, it’ll be all over Facebook
And our Lois Lanes won’t give him a second look
Changing in a phone booth won’t be possible
Ours are way too small, he might end up in hospital
He won’t be able to fly, he’d walk to crime scenes
Cause his cape got stolen, and he’d be wearing a pair of jeans
Lex Luthor would be too busy playing X-Box
While Superman’s career is on the rocks
He would've lost all his strength in street fights
And developed a drug habit by now, the poor Kryptonite
04 June 2015
Dude my car just blew up
The dang fire killed my pup
I'm tired of my junk car
I might go kill myself in the bar
I went to a phone booth
I decided to make out with my tooth
I tried to make a call
But it was broke so I sold it to a mall
I need to get my car fixed
But I cut my arm, so now I need to go get it stitched
I was walking till someone stopped beside me
He flipped me off and then hit into a tree
I laughed at him and he got out of his vehicle
He then grabbed me by the throat and stabbed me with a nickel
Just when i thought it couldn't get any worse
I bought myself a purse
I saw a cop so i went up to him
I asked if he could drive me home
He laughed and asked if I need a trim
I said no but he still gave me a comb
I then just killed the cop and stole his car
I could have walked home it wasn't even that far
The county seat, a place of humidity and musical beats.
After many years, I decided to revisit my hometown,
Hoping to walk down memory lanes of warm treats, To visit my oldest brother and old friends still around.
Known by many as the birthplace of the blues.
It’s where my folks purchased my first pair of shoes.
Where I first experienced talking from a phone booth.
Where I watched my first movie on the big screen;
Where I experienced my first barbershop;
Where I received my first real job;
Where I ate at my first restaurant.
Thirty years ago, I moved 2,000 miles away.
A popular street corner, fourth & Issaquena.
Cotton gins and cotton bails.
Yes, cotton was crowned king.
There was only room for one king and one throne.
And the ruler ship of queens was virtually unknown.
There were the king and the cash; and if there were queens, they would be beneath the king and his cash, and nowhere in between.
I tell you, everything and everyone bowed to king cotton, even queens.
06262015 cj
Take 1:
Too much beauty is a problem,
So the pretty women say,
Many women can be threatened,
Mood swings like a pendulum
Never trusting in ‘fair play.’
So it hurts when they dismiss you
Best to not give you a chance,
You might try to steal their boyfriends,
Smugly now your faults imbue
Though you’ve stolen not one dance.
Competition can be fierce then,
Few believe these days in fate,
Their self-confidence can vanish,
No faith too in gentle men,
If the guy once shows up late.
Come on lassies, what’s your hurry,
Shouldn’t love be ‘laissez-faire?’
Ditching friends for men so slimy,
Dressed up in your finery?
Is your love so ‘ordinaire?’
Take 2:
Being smart too is a problem,
Life itself not hard enough,
Toughs that ambush after schools out,
There’s a gift in being dumb!
You think calculus is rough?
All young people want to fit in,
Live with hearts out on their sleeve,
Smart kids really do no better,
Though you’d think that they might win,
Teenage angst yields no reprieve.
Still my brain saved me from football,
Grinding work for adult thrills,
Qualified for cannon fodder,
Young boys think they have it all,
Girls and glory, mindless drills.
But the youth who show brain merit,
Though rewards are slow to come,
Find they bypass many hazards,
Foolish plans elaborate:
Author's now of their outcome.
Take 3:
Having bread is a conundrum,
Still ‘death,’ you win on a bet,
Jealousy makes you a pit bull,
Lost decorum stained your bum,
Reputation? Just forget!
Dreams of poor men are a half-truth,
Fueled by their desires unmet,
Riches, splendor all they think of,
‘Clark Kents’ enters glass phone booth,
Men inside still curse kismet.
People! Rich! That live in prisons,
That’s what our world has come to,
Iron fences blocking access,
Wealthy hold they’re denizens,
Why do they seem like they’re blue?
How did our world fall to misfits,
I’m a have, but you have not,
All one needs is just one bullet,
Don’t you think this is the pits?
Murderer lives on your lot.
Brian Johnston
Auguest 17, 2014
The equivalent of a cosmic flat tire, the star collector overheated again.
Should've topped off the subzero heat transmogger back at Stuckey's.
Yep we have 'em too.., who doesn't need a Pecan Log Roll, now and then.
Two Roadway startruckers snapped up the last Elmer's paste pies., the luckys.
Right between filling stations to boot, no triple A for a gojillion miles..
and one of my best pint sized, non-binary service robots on the blink.
Not my best idea, feeding her moonshrooms, peaked all his cortial dials,
eventually caused them to puke it up, all over my excremental sink.
Frazusoosh it! not even a UPB (Universal Phone Booth) to make a collect call,
to my mother (planet), which, by the way, is also useful for transmitting matter.
That's assuming you can find someone to accept the charges, of course, LOL.
Had to wash dishes for an eternity, last time, including dried on crupecake batter.
Drack's balls! stuck on this puny planet with obnoxious fumes corroding my chromium tail.
No wonder they call it air; the sixth least favorite word in the Corpadian lingo, P.U.!
Those creatures keep staring, I've tried to reason with them, even tried telepthy to no avail.
When I type in their reply to my trans-googling translator, all it comes back as is 'Moo'.
Oh thank goodness! A family of grubbers in a U Haul pulling over., whew!
Though probably have to sit on a lap, luckily they each have two.
252 words, including these
Strange things happened that last time my Grandpa drove to town
He scrapped a nine eleven and mowed a phone booth down
Folkies in the future will very likely sing
The man trashed a McDonald’s but spared a Burger King
It barely made the papers, just local news in some
Someone should have told them that there was worse to come
Spielberg’s gonna make a movie, if the rumour’s sound
Of the total devastation when Grandma drove to town
19 December 2018
For Succinct contest
Sponsor Michelle Faulkner
Urban legend now bared to the bone
Yet its trademark can no larger store clone
No glossy signs, spacious lots fealty to hone
But in colloquial parlance a tradition has grown
Larger Discount stores with dignity stand alone
Corner grocery, its squalid tenement doth bemoan
Manicured plots, concentric lots posh boutiques tone
Corner mart encased in fragile clapboards; skyscrapers of stone
Dilapidated phone booth anchors the curbstone
Squeaky door, bristling bell on entry doth groan
Large retailers, in furnished bakeries bake cakes, fancy scones
Mom and Pop, in one-stove kitchens; yeast rolls, cornbread pone
Serious browsers in large retailers with oversize carts spendthrift prone
At corner store, single-minded shoppers poach sustenance, then are gone
Large franchise with hefty profits and in fertile market sown
Corner grocer in depressed neighborhood; indebted to Savings & Loan
She broke down
Like a Ford in a storm
Anything to garner a reaction
Who could resist that pretty little red dress,
Soaked, and covered in oil?
Not anyone I knew,
And I knew myself well.
I slowed to a lame dog's pace
to get a better look
As she pulled a rusty iron
From a burlap bag in the boot.
She very well coulda been
Holding a Bible
She looked so sorry.
I changed in a phone booth
Quick like the wind to her back
And flew in on my red n' blues.
A bomber makes a fine umbrella
For a roadside Stella.
And, by starlight she watched
An artist in his element.
She did her best to shield me
With our leather lean-to
As my hands made
Their way under the skirt
Of the broke lady;
Handled with a delicate firmness
Only experience can bestow.
I knew what I was doing.
Graciousness was God's gift
To her it seemed,
As she lit a cigarette to
Spite the rain
And pressed it to my lips;
my hands were spoken for.
A look and a smile
Was all I could muster as
The deluge made quiet
The victorious purr
The old beast let out in relief.
"Thanks" with a kiss to my cheek
Was the moment I knew.
She scurried off to slam the door
Before I realized she was gone.
I was gonna miss that jacket.
COMMUNICATION
no one calls, no talk
and letter writing who writes
comunication
I drop a dime in
into the dial pay phone booth
pick up please no talk
silence becomes gold
in the quietness riches
communication
3/14/18
Written words by James Edward Lee Sr. ©2018
I need you to call me
I see your tears in every digit I dial
Hoping your forgiveness will pick up and warm me
Silence was a sanction given to me without a trial
Seating next to this phone listening to my feelings
Realising that I am I because you are
My stupidity found a loop hole in your feelings
If only you pick up, I will tell you that "you are"
I will stand in this rain demanding for your forgiveness
Create a pile of rocks until I break your window
I love that you are my weakness
As I dream of taking these actions while tears stain my pillow
Please, I need you to call me
I will recite these words on your answering machine
Hoping my voice will find a spot as yours has in me
Forget the world as long as you are mine
All of this love with your name on it
Spray paint this phone booth until you notice me
Your number is a key combination to our happiness, so i'm redialling it
When you receive all 99 of them, please call me.
I play my position
Systematically,
Organically,
I see seconds tick away
as the structural DNA of the competition
frantically loses its matter by way of decomposition,
All living forms under a serious threat,
Environmentally and socially are very erratic emotionally,
Society is changing so fast like Clark Kent in a phone booth,
The cells of our future investments rapidly firing wildly
like the KKK trying to kill a ***** boy on an unlit night route,
There may be no return.
The nucleus of the situation needs stimulation
to continue to expand while watering its hand,
Cause the leaves may die and so goes the chlorophyll to this land,
The sun is our source of energy,
It’s a shame for the most part the inability
to develop any sort of synergy,
Leaving the constant back at step one,
Alone,
Wishing and subconsciously staring at the winning team,
The inaccuracies may seem too great for me to edit this composition,
I only wish to see change before my gradual deposition.
Remembering 11
I think I loved her from that first day we kissed
Now I try remembering all the things I had missed.
One day I said to my wife you know you’re hot
Her response back to me was, no, no I’m not.
I said yes you are, I know because you’re my wife
I love you darling more than life.
I guess we were lucky when she realized I was the right guy
She must have seen something when she looked in my eye.
Many times the kids had us challenge each other
I was always proud she was my kid’s mother.
Money or material items are things you can replace
Not time, I could have done more when we were face to face.
My kids will have the poems of my wife
They will remember she was my life.
I remember a few things from the 50’s
Then came marriage and children in the 60’s.
Some funny and cute things my Joey use to do
They might not have been the same to you.
She would hold on to the phone booth and dance
I would focus on her like being in a trance.
I can’t change the passed it’s left back in life
I can only think and dream back of my wife.
I always had an addiction for my wife
I will be hooked to her the rest of my life.
Maybe writing my poems, I won’t forget so much
I’ll read them and hope to feel my wife’s touch.
Some people ask about my poems, the how and why
Because I hope my wife will be remembered even after I…..