Just Like That!

 

jobe

—Poetry by jobe, Davis, CA

—Public Domain Photos Courtesy of jobe

 

The moon sets in west just after dawn
And a two-seedling fir takes root, is born,
Just like that.
I was born three thousand miles from this valley,
But this is where I took root and came to life,
Just like that.
Sacramento Valley, mice and hawks,
Land of burrowing owls.
Defined by the river,
A land defined by the water.


The power of water, moving, rushing.
The power of land, rich, giving.
It is just after dawn
And moon has set in the west,
The sun clears the pine tops.
Clear, blue sky.
A two-seedling fir takes root, born,
And this is where I took root and came to life.
Just like that.
Just like that.

 

 

 

 

 

No one bothers me, I like that. Look at the sky,
It is like the palette of an artist
Who works with shades of gold and blue.
Morning sounds from the first birds.
Mount Diablo at dawn.

 

 

 

 

 

Rain falls steadily on the patio as I watch.
Heavier drops fall from the edge of the roof.
After the rain there is a light fog,
It seems to rise from the ground.
The night passes and although I am tired,
I do not sleep.

 

 

 

 

 

If my country is to be a country of children in cages
then shoot me now
Before the lock clicks behind one more frightened child
put a bullet in my head
For if we are to be the country with caged children
we are dead already, friend

 

 

 

 

 

A full winter of the pandemic, COVID-19.
Many of us will not see the next summer.
We are caterpillars entering the cocoon,
Those who live will emerge as butterflies
And the rest will enter the great darkness.
The nights grow colder, and I shiver
In my reading chair, even with a thick blanket.
I am growing old, and it is more than my age,
I feel it in my bones. I reach for a book,
Desert Poems, fine work by David Hinton.
Summer will or will not come for me.
Why worry about what I cannot know?

___________________

Today’s LittleNip:

Let silence be the conversation I seek.
What is speech but a kind of bragging?
Shut up, jobe. In life
You have already succeeded.

—jobe

___________________
 
Our thanks to jobe (James Lee Jobe) for dropping into the Kitchen today, after a bit of a hiatus! James Lee says, “Please sign me as: jobe. I know, it's weird. That's actually why I like it.” For more of jobe, go to james-lee-jobe.blogspot.com/.

___________________

—Medusa

 

 

 

—Public Domain Photo Courtesy of Joseph Nolan, Stockton, CA


 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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