We are those particles of dust that float in the sunlight pouring through the window. A good breeze and whoosh, we’re gone. Friend, we are not invincible. And that’s alright; did you want to live forever? Come. Let’s open all the windows and see what happens.
jobe
You may write me down in history with your bitter, twisted lines. You may trod me in the very dirt, but still, like dust, I'll rise.
Maya Angelou
the day will come
when I walk over the hill
and disappear
the day will come
when I push the boat
out into the current
and let the river carry me away
even now, tonight, I might
reach out and touch the stars
one at a time
jobe
Gabriela Mistral 1889-1957, of Chile, was a lay member of the Franciscan order. Her first love was a railroad worker who killed himself, and she never married. Her poems often reflect her Catholism, and she was an influence on Chilean poet Pablo Neruda.
Pockets
Are generally over or around
Erogenous zones, they seem to dive
In the direction of those
Dark places, and indeed
It is their nature to be dark
Themselves, keeping a kind
Of thieves' kitchen for the things
Sequestered from the world
For long or little while,
The keys, the handkerchiefs,
The sad and vagrant little coins
That are really only passing through.
For all they locate close to lust,
No pocket ever sees another;
There is in fact a certain sadness
To pockets, going in their lonesome ways
And snuffling up their sifting storms
Of dust, tobacco bits and lint.
A pocket with a hole in it
Drops out; from shame, is that, or pride?
What is a pocket but a hole?
Howard Nemerov, 1920-1991
Howard Nemerov was twice Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress, from 1963 to 1964 and again from 1988 to 1990. That was before they shortened the title to Poet Laureate of the United States. I was Poet Laureate of Davis, California, not quite as prestigious, but as you can see, I stuck it in here anyway. Nemerov, a native New Yorker, also won the National Book Award for Poetry, Pulitzer Prize for Poetry, and Bollingen Prize. I sometimes claim that I won the 1972 Binky Sumpwort Award for Non-Rhyming Couplets, but that is, alas, a jest.
we, the people
live in this field
that goes on and on
there is no fence
no border
no end
flatness and crops
rays from the sun
light up our faces
jobe
When you are insane, you are busy being insane - all the time.
Sylvia Plath
The eye is one window onto the world and the heart is another. What do you see when you look out? And what do you see when you look in?
jobe
I am a political man, but I don’t want to be political here on the book of jobe. So I’m going to tell you a story. A true story from 1913.
Fifty years after the 1863 Battle of Gettysburg the survivors gathered again on the battlefield. A remembrance to honor the fallen. The old men, many missing limbs, recreated Pickett's Charge, a part of the battle filled with death and courage on both sides. The Confederate vets let out their famous rebel yell, still chilling after a half-century, and started up the hill. On top, the Union vets ran out to meet them head-on, just as they had as young soldiers. But when the two sides met, they just stopped, looked at each other, and began to weep. North and South together, the old men embraced and cried and said prayers that it would never happen again.
We're all Americans, please don't let us do this terrible thing again. I hear talk of a another civil war, or hear about the potential for one on the news, and I am horrified. Left or Right, vote for the change you want. Run for office, or support someone who is running. Organize, debate, vote. Think of those old veterans in 1913, and their tears.
Thank for reading this.
jobe