SIT NEAR THE FRONT

Another day one.

Another first day of a

new semester

with new notebooks and 

new highliters.

We’ve been here before. 

We can be glad for Joe and

Kamala and her 

husband and 

Amanda Gorman.

But it’s 

our name 

we wrote

carefully

on the new 

blank notebooks.

 

IT WAS FREEZING COLD BUT CLEAR

I took a bus

from here with my

Nikon camera

around my neck

and a backpack 

and a book I can’t remember 

to Washington

DC to see

what it would be like

on Barack Obama’s 

Inauguration Day.

Tomorrow Amanda Gorman will recite a poem she wrote for the Inauguration. She’s the youngest poet to do this. She’s great in this PBS video from yesterday:

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/poet-tapped-for-inauguration-to-spread-a-message-of-unity?fbclid=IwAR0sljCSkej55XJwXL_3wwlunhJ5IcGJn0ISlwSB0PnE0QVXKPy5Yy_ShKw

 

KING OF THE WILD FRONTIER

Every day 

we turn away 

from the dream we had

to be a hero like 

Davy Crockett was.

We watch TV instead.

We read about things

we’ve read about

before.

We get mad at non-heroic

things we see

in other people.

I had a coonskin hat.