I’m in Portland, Oregon for the Stafford Challenge Poetry Conference, and Glenda Funk and I have been out meeting people on the streets, taking notes of what to do while we are here.
Taking Notes
Glenda and I went people-ing
on the streets of Portland
asking folks
What’s your favorite thing
to do here?
then smiled for quick snapshots
to remember these kind souls
Ellie likes parks ~ waterfalls and Pioneer Square
Josh likes fishing ~ salmon and rivers
Joe likes running and showed us to a garden
Cheriss likes staying home (she attracts dead ancestors)
Arthur yawns ~ he likes sleeping
Higinio likes remembering Venezuela and Miami
Librarian poet Leslie likes reading and eating Ethiopian food
Matt likes adventure ~ camping on Mt. Hood (he has a feral cat named Big O)
Scott’s favorite thing to do is eat
we are all a human tribe~
how can we not be filled with
such a vast love,
this diverse and unified living of life?
Common Threads 
Kim, love, love the perfect getaway take in your poem. People! And the sweet details you add–salmon, attracting dead ancestors, Venezuela and Miami, eating Ethiopian food. Such precision that begins to show the vastness and diversity of humanity. That last stanza is just such a beautiful and important question.
And then to see photos with some of these people is just the icing on the human cake!
LikeLike