We Always Have Been

Part 1

Today we must be moving closer to rain

Today for certain

Even in sleep I listen for the window rattle

Like every joyful jump rope song I ever knew

Part 2

We aren’t gone you know

In spite of all reports

Accusations

Predictions

We aren’t gone

They jackhammered our names out of the sidewalk

There on 25th

The theatre a gym

The theatre a parking garage

The theatre a housing development

The other day

Before dawn

By the Main Library

The streets still steaming

I remember

When that was magic enough

Part 3

There on the hill

We used to pick wild blackberries

The woman on the corner tells me

She can’t get rid of them

The canes keep coming up

Between carefully planted

Unfamiliar

Roses

Part 4

Pocket full of toasted bay nuts

Anything is possible

At this time of day the bay is brighter than the hills

Gives back light

Gives it back

In overtone green of delta water

Sinking blue and Pacific

I miss the mudflat sculptures on the way to the bridge

Part 5

Rain and

Finally rain

With that characteristic laugh

As if we spent every morning just like this

Part 6

I’ve built a bridge out of coated copper wire and

The tiny lawn daisies from near the museum

We aren’t a museum

Not a funeral

Not a broken bottle

We’ve built a bridge together

But haven’t found the footings yet

I know what they say but they’ve been wrong before

Part 7

Walk with me and I will show you things

They aren’t secrets but not too many people know them

Shhhh some will tell you that we were one culture here

Listen, you can hear the gull cries too

Part 8

Before they paved Market

You could tell the time by the wind and dust

In that movie

They drive by Uncle Fred’s tailor shop

Right there

You can see a couple through the window of the Victorian

On the fountain

Try to remember that the bay isn’t just low tide, we are more than that