bent to this task

Their eyes are like blank sheets of paper.
These stanzas are like having to wear a weird shirt. The buttonsÂ
don't line up right. There are no pockets.Â
The lines of this poem are a factory that employsÂ
the dead. Ghosts of people that walkÂ
on concrete floors, their eyesÂ
like blank sheets of paper. Do youÂ
have a pen? Me neither.Â
What is a day? Rows and linesÂ
of broken things - dreams, hopes, love.Â
No, that's too hard and I reject it.Â
A day is you with your shoes off.Â
You are running toward meÂ
laughing. You are telling meÂ
about some poet from The Gaza StripÂ
or Kentucky.
Where are the jars that hold those thingsÂ
we saved? Paper clips and erasers. OddÂ
screws and bolts. Jars that didn't have lidsÂ
anymore. That no one wanted,Â
like these poems.Â
I am bent to this task that I have given myself.Â
For fifty years I have kept busy, and nowÂ
I don't think I know how to stop.
james lee jobe
If you attain unsurpassable, complete enlightenment, all sentient beings also attain it. The reason is that all sentient beings are aspects of enlightenment.
Eihei Dogen Zenji

children of delight and sorrow
the hawks scream, playing together on the ceiling of heaven.Â
-kenneth rexroth
son,Â
we are children of delight and sorrow, we are the soundÂ
of massive waves against a boulder-strewn beach, we are moonbeams,Â
we are a thought of something greater.Â
and my dear boy, we are riding on the wings of hawks, we are slippingÂ
through the walls of heaven like the wind, like feathers, we are infinite,Â
souls without end, like dreams.Â
and it is almost time to go.
james lee jobe
LINK: Assume the Role of Cassandra, Wearing a Mask, Speaking into the Camera, a poem by Carolina Ebeid
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