September 2017
Jeannie E. Roberts
jeannie.roberts@jrcreative.biz
jeannie.roberts@jrcreative.biz
I live in Wisconsin's Chippewa Valley area, where I write, draw and paint, and often photograph my natural surroundings. I enjoy spending time outdoors, biking, boating, and fishing with my husband, and taking walks with our dog, a thirteen-year-old golden doodle named Yogi. My poems and photography appear in Portage Magazine and other journals. My fifth poetry collection, The Wingspan of Things, is forthcoming from Dancing Girl Press.
Clearing Trees, the Makings of a Subdivision
You can dig, hammer, rip, and cut with confidence.
Make More Profit with Cat® Excavators
The boom extends its yellow undoing.
Its bucket positions above crown, atop
leader. Yielding, the trunk snaps, hits
ground.
We watch as the wild expanse behind
our home retreats to hydraulic force,
to the arm of progress, and to the beast
of profit.
We'd admired those trees, especially the
little burr oak that thrived on the corner,
we'd even thought to save it. My essence
aches for the oak, the pine, the birch,
and the locust. How do you stop money's
momentum? It seems we break when the
beautiful succumbs to ugliness, we shatter,
though we yield to it.
It's easier. The path has been cleared for us,
and we take it knowing that the road less
traveled, the snarl through alder and thicket,
can be a bitch.
Why, Oh Why, Did We Move from the Country
―in the spirit of Theodore Roethke's poem
"CHILD ON TOP OF A GREENHOUSE"
The construction workers cussing in unison,
My ears ringing from radios blasting near
Bulldozers beeping and generators rumbling,
A concrete mixer blocking our driveway,
Revolving its drum, the half-built development
Exploding with noise, all summer long,
Like a war zone, reverberating with hammers,
Staple-guns, and eighteen-wheelers delivering
Sod, the neighborhood dogs barking, protecting
Their turf, my dog growling, pulling his leash,
Rushing toward the neighborhood dogs barking,
Protecting their turf, and me, today, and every day,
Wishing for trees, songbirds, and the still tranquility
Of nature, thinking:
The 3:20 School Bus
Rumbling down our dead end road,
#291 still carries my heart.
Memories roll as it hums and rattles,
turns and travels, back to you.
Like clockwork, your image appears
dashing up the front steps while
cheerfully proclaiming, "Mamasan!"
We laugh and talk. I make a grilled
cheese sandwich. Now, you ride
the light rail. I walk the dog
and as the bus barrels past, I smile,
wave, and with gratitude, remember.
Mourning dove calls as scent of lilac
balms the air.
Mama robin attends her nest.
A feather floats in the afternoon light.
©2017 Jeannie E. Roberts
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