Friday, June 7, 2019

Josie Says

Morning Song by Naomi Shihab Nye

The tiny journalist
will tell us what she sees.
Document the moves, the dust,
soldiers blocking the road.
Yes, she knows how to take a picture
with her phone. Holds it high
like a balloon. Yes, she would
prefer to dance and play,
would prefer the world
to be pink. It is her job to say
what she sees, what is happening.
From her vantage point everything
is huge—but don’t look down on her.
She’s bigger than you are.
If you stomp her garden
each leaf expands its view.
Don’t hide what you do.
She sees you at 2 a.m. adjusting your
impenetrable vest.
What could she have
that you want? Her treasures,
thing shiny buttons her grandmother loved.
Her cousin, her uncle.
There might have been a shirt. . .
The tiny journalist notices
action on far away roads
farther even than the next village.
She takes counsel from bugs so
puffs of dust find her first.
Could that be a friend? 
They pretended not to see us.
They came at night with weapons. 
What was our crime? That we liked
respect as they do? That we have pride? 
She stares through a hole in the fence,
barricade of words and wire,
feels the rising fire
before anyone strikes a match.
She has a better idea.






Observations from the almost five year old ...


// After dropping off Clementine off at school and needing some gas, I told Josie we would pick up some sort of breakfast at the gas station (mom win). We pulled up to the pump and Josie said, eyes twinkling, "This is breakfast ... for the car!"




// After watching a pet rescue commercial before Dumbo in the theater, wistfully: "I wish I could be a goy*, touching a dog."

*girl

[She understands her allergies as best she can and doesn't pet dogs and cats (she can't be around cats at all)]





// Lately she's been talking about death frequently and making heartbreaking existential observations like:

   I wish I was one year old, then it would be a long time til I die.


  I know what happens when you die! You close your eyes and they put a rock on your head.



// On her upcoming visit to the Arch: I'm a wittle bit scared of swipping off - it might be swippewy!



// Luke took her on a daddy-daughter date to the botanical garden on one of the first warm days of spring. Caught unawares over a jet at the splash pad, she starting yelling at the top of her lungs: It's freezing my vulva!







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