Just After Sunset

East

The Belt of Venus

surrounds us from the east

just above the rising shadow

of the earth

we believe

the beauty of the world

will sustain us

waiting in stillness

amid the reality of time

From a Hillltop

—jo'b

We came to know

All we wanted

Was silence

The Path That Connects Us

— jo'b

You go on ahead

I'll stay behind

Unless you want to climb

Through this broken window

Into the blur of fall.

Interstellar

jo'b

  

Circling the sun, endlessly spinning

in infinite night, searching for others,

others like us, like us but better,

searching for life more advanced,

wiser and kinder, rational and peaceful—

such is our hope.

So much empty space,

cold and dark between fires—

yet surely, surely,

from what we know of infinity,

others surely exist, those are the odds—

 but lifetimes, lifetimes to reach.

May we be what we seek,

endlessly spinning, searching

for others like us, if only

just down the road, wiser

and kinder, circling the sun—

alone together, for now.

Making It Count

— jo'b

  How briefly

  we flare

  on this old earth,

  How quickly

  our tracks

  fade behind us.

In Late September

— jo'b

In late September

when everything already

is more than enough

I go to the woods

vivid after rain

sweeter for the cool

pursed lips of the wind

deeper for the kindnesses

of people I love

richer for the fallen years

that spice the tiled ground

these few shining acres

this immense quiet

this brief recurring ecstasy.

 

Skyward

jo'b

                    Flat on the ground

                    under the billow and drift,

                    losing my grip on the earth,

                    consciousness rising as heat,

                    scattered galactic,

                    knowing for an instant

                    the freedom and release

                    of going atomic,

                    levitational peace,

                    recombinant.

Afield, IRL*

jo'b

                        It's simple really.

                        I walk the field.

                        I write my lines.

                        Orion leaps from the woods

                        And over the world.

                        I bolt the door.

* — Social media parlance for "In Real Life," as opposed to digital life.

Inspired by a quote from J.D. Salinger's "A Boy in France."

Homesteaders

jo'b

Our windows have been broken out                    

For nearly forty years                    

The wind blows through us                    

And the snow slants in                    

Each winter colder than the last                   

We don't need a forecast                   

Yet some of us stay on                   

Anchored by sunsets and ashes                   

Om

jo'b

  Out of black crowns

  Harmonics rising

  The vibrating moon

  Sanguine and whole

  Struck like a tuning fork

  An old man in shadow

  Tries to get it down

  Waning in indigo.

  

When

jo'b

Then walk the beach at sunrise

Wounded soul

Where there is no sea

Hindus and Buddhists

jo'b

We sat in silence side-by-side

and watched the sea collapsing on the bar,

and felt its strength,  

but dared not say its name,

accepting age and circumstance

and deep respect — too late for us.

Yet the tides that moved us then,

they move us still, on our separate hilltops,

clouds expanding over the valley,

ridge-to-ridge in this inverted world.

And if, as Hindus and Buddhists believe,

if there is a Next, I'll look for you,

and side-by-side we'll sit again

and feel this old earth roll.