On the Way Somewhere Else

Photo by Katy Brown, Davis

THREE POEMS IN WHICH 

SACRAMENTO IS MENTIONED

—Kevin Jones, Fair Oaks

I.

Sam Brannan,
They say,
Helped start
The Gold Rush
By running
Through the streets
Of San Francisco
Wearing a bottle green
Suit, waving a vial and
Shouting “Gold!
Gold from the American
River above Sacramento!”

I’ve always appreciated
Good advertising,
But where
Would you find
A bottle green suit
Nowadays?


II.

On the way out west,
My wife and I
Stopped
To take a ride
On the Grand Canyon
Railroad.

Wide.  Deep.  Impressive.
Less so was the inevitable
Black Bart the Train Robber,
With his usual henchpeople.

Soon dispatched by gallant
Trainmen and conductors,
They were replaced by
The less inevitable
Celtic folk group.

I like the Celts, and my wife
Is fond of percussion.
Drummer let her
Try his bodhran.

“Where you headed?”
He asked.  “Sacramento.”
“Pretty,” he said. “Can I
Have my drum back?”
Ta-tum.

“Lovely place.  Lots of
Trees,” he said, “Please,
My drum?”
Paum, pam, pum.

“Please! You’ll love
Sacramento! Can I
Have my damn
Drum back?” Pa-
Rum pum pum pum.

III.

We were going through
Redding on the way
Somewhere else.

Beneath the overpass
I noticed a
White and bright
Blue train
Heading south.
Ladies and gentlemen,
Boys and girls—
The Ringling Brothers,
Barnum and Bailey
Circus train!

We pulled over
To watch, along with
Maybe the rest
Of Redding.  From
The crowd: “Where
You going?”
The reply, big and
Mellow:
“SAC
RA
MEN
TO
CALI
FOR
NIA!”
“Ringmaster,”
I said.
“Home,”
I said.

______________

Claudia Lamar writes to say she is launching an online poetry journal, Phantom Kangaroo, and is soliciting poems for her first issue: www.phantomkangaroo.com

______________

OVERDUE BALANCE SHEET
—Thérèse Plantier

Forgot to mail my letter to my friend Death

lost my pocketbook

took a lot of turns too sharply to the left

caught cold caught hot caught tepid caught fire caught nothing

skidded on an ice patch

had to chase from one place to another

parked

screwed up (got control in time)

hit the jackpot in matters of sheer idiocy

buried a cat I wrapped in the morning paper

was ashamed

was brave

was down and out

talked too much heard too much

tore my life to shreds

burned a hole in my pantsuit with a cigarette

and all at once caught sight of night.

(Translated from the French by Maxine Kumin and Judith Kumin)

____________________

DOORS
—Thérèse Plantier

They unfold before the sky

I escape from these doors

into my vast night

without you,

you alone, restless,

half-charred

on your island splashed

with the squeezed juice of animals,

you come apart through your own powers

you sink under your own weight

in the middle of a black concrete clearing

where octopus trees move away

each tree replaced by a smoking door

by a blinker

a circular house

puncutated by innumerable incinerations.

(Translated from the French by Willis Barnstone and Elene Kolb)

____________

Today's LittleNip:

Like a sweet apple reddening on the high

tip of the topmost branch and forgotten

by the pickers—no, beyond their reach.

Like a hyacinth crushed in the mountains

by shepherds; lying trampled on the earth

yet blooming purple.

—Sappho (translated from the Greek by Willis Barnstone)

____________

—Medusa

Photo by Katy Brown