Yolo County is in the Sacramento Valley, and has been my home since I was a young man in my 30s, which is decades. Our town is Davis, our younger two kids grew up here, and our oldest lived here from her late teens until adulthood. The youngest died at 25, and his ashes are scattered here. My wife and I grew into seniors here. This is home. I seldom leave here, once in a while I might have something to do in Sacramento, which is close. My wife teaches here, and I have been the poet laureate for Davis, now emiritus. This is home, this town, this county, this valley, the Putah Creek watershed; these places are home to me, and as such, I have a lot of poems about my place in this world. Every now and then I will post a few of them here in a group. So today is a good day for that.
james
The Yolo Bypass Wildlife Area
Yolo County, Sacramento Valley
Light in the winter morning,Â
a gray glow through the tule fog,Â
a fog that sits low across the bottom lands,Â
hugging the creeks and blanketing the reeds and oleander,Â
a gray sunrise that is just barely kissing the dawn,Â
and the silver sky is low, all is still,Â
an easy light, gentle and gray,Â
a love, a thought, a hope.
And the creeks themselves,Â
Cache Creek and Putah Creek,Â
dark and cold and fast,Â
rinsing the earth,Â
washing away the dust of summer with winter's bath,Â
like dancers to a wild Spanish mambo,Â
sisters of the rock and bone of living,Â
the blood veins to the body of the valley,Â
as strong as gods, full of life,Â
and full of death.
The valley is a marsh,Â
a garden for herons and waterbirds,Â
a green grocer for any who would tend it, love it,Â
treat it like a mother or a daughter,Â
the soil made rich and sweet from the centuries spent underwater,Â
when this valley was a great sea,Â
from water to soil to table to stomach,
worked with love.
It is winter,Â
it is morning,Â
another fine day in our valley.
Driving the Yolo County, California farm roads near my home
I was quite pleased to discover a mountain.
This valley is flat, so where is the mountain?
Anyone would ask that. Inside my heart.
The mountain is huge and has no trail.
I do not know what is up there,
but I intend to climb to the top.
On the bank of Putah Creek
I pay a father’s respects
To the ashes of a fallen son.
The creek pays no attention
And flows on as always.
Time, however, stands
Perfectly still.
I am eating Peking duck from a bag
While watching the ducks on Putah Creek.
This world can be harsh, and I want to do right in it.
I have rejected cruelty from my life as much
As I can. I have begun to shy away from violent films
And TV shows. I watch what I say, I make an effort
To not hurt people with my words. I want to do good
In this life, the best I can with the time I have left.
The creek is lovely here, slow, dark. The ducks
Are used to people eating on these benches,
And they make ripples in the thick water as they swim
Toward me. Not know what I am eating, the first one
Approaches me. I pull a bite size piece of meat
From the bone and toss it to him. He makes happy sounds
As he unwittingly swallows his way into cannibalism.
Oh well. Tomorrow is another day.
Where I live the earth is rather flat,
and my flat town, Davis, California,
is barely five miles across in any direction.
I like to bicycle to where I need to go.
after the first few months I got somewhat bored
with riding down the same streets again and again,
but after thirty-some years I love doing this.
Every block I roll down is like visiting an old friend.
There’s fresh paint on that house. It’s lovely.
and look, the afternoon sunlight on the sycamore tree
glows like polished gold offered to heaven.
Hello there, old dog. How are you doing today?
poems by james lee jobe
Tomatoes are a main cash crop, also almonds, walnuts, rice, and wheat. Ballcaps are big sellers, too. Now, I have a number of ballcaps, but I also have a birthday coming up soon. I’m ordering this one.
Thanks for reading this. When you eat tomatoes, think of us here in Yolo County.
james