David Michael Jackson

For Just A Second

Glimpses through the trees,

landscapes captured for a second

from the highways,

these are what is left of your

world when you don’t pull over

and you are left with glimpses

soon covered up with

asphalt and concrete

bricks and mortar

and semi-trailers

Sometimes

– David Michael Jackson

***

IN THESE CLUTTERED TIMES
somehow these places eventually lose
identity too in these
cluttered times
passenger creek still weaves through
sugar camp hollow.
there are still legends and indians for
awhile still
for a short while
but up grant’s chapel road
grant’s chapel being of course long gone
there being left only a cemetery with
one
stone
empty coffin
just up from the biggest oak in any parts
which is at the deserted settlement just off the trail of tears
which is now
gone
the oak being there in some wealthy back yard
the settlement cleaned away except in my memory
It was once to be had by slipping around the pond,
the pond being now gone
and the frogs
yet Passenger Creek still weaves it’s history
through sugar camp hollow,
where it has been said Indian ghosts protect confederate gold
for
a
little
while
yet

– David Jackson
***

OH, HELLO

willie and lobo
tonight
and the summer nights oh

the summer nights
the hazy moon says
hello
the last of the brandy says
goodbye

and we come and go and pass into the
summer
nights
and we become the wind in the grasses
and the hot breeze which passes
makes us like leather,
tough enough to take the heat
ah,
bring it on
I’ll sit here and run my toes in the freshly cut grass
and tough it out

– David Jackson.

***

a poem for elisha
my friend he teaches me to be free
he teaches me
to try yes, to simply try
that is all that is required
and I am proud to sit in
his shadow as
the rain falls or
the sun burns my day
I am proud to say
I was not there in the battles
I was not there in the kibbutz
in the dry dusty streets
waiting for the army trucks
waiting for the war
I was not there
my friend was and he speaks for me
and he leads me
beside the still
waters
such is my love
for my friend

– David Jackson

***

or more trivial
and evil by the connection,
lockstep,
or
stupid expression of
athiesm, or
what, stupidity?
What did he expect,
that the hordes would not rise?
leaving his daughter
at risk?
One wonders
either way,
like the 200 nukes in Pakistan and India

If you cover yourself with manure
then radiation cannot affect
you.
The NUKES are sAFE mAN
nO pROBLEM
everything’s fine,
and if you happen to be from another galaxy and
find this
amid the fossil remains,
well,
we blew ourselves up.
***