My California

And a wedding on a cable car

Cable Car, No. 25, San Francisco, CA. Photo by Thomas Wolf, http://www.foto-tw.de/. Wikimedia Commons

My California

fresh roast coffee
small batch chocolate

a cat, not a dog,
rolling and lolling in the sun

El Niño, La Niña, tides and phases 
of the moon, layers on and off 

gray sky and green hills in January
plum blossoms in February

mixed-up Augusts in leggings and  
boots dashing across streets 

climbing hills, riding cable cars
long walks ending with cappuccinos 

black turtlenecks, poetry
angst-ridden laughter

Northern, not Southern
upside down, inside out

rain on the rooftops
rhythm of hip hop

extremes of drought 
and bomb cyclones

million-dollar bungalows
and homeless encampments

stock options and fentanyl
Yimbys and Nimbys

labyrinthian red tape
anything or anyone goes

protests and marches
idealistic and cynical 

my state on the edge
of the continent 

I knew I wanted to move to California in fifth grade when I visited San Francisco with my parents during Spring break. My dad was here on business so my mother and I explored the city. One day we went Ghirardelli Square and then hopped on the cable car along with a wedding party to travel back up the hill. The groom wore mime, the bride wore a traditional wedding dress, and the cable car operator played the Wedding March as we traveled up Hyde St. I said then and there to my mother: “I’m moving to California, and I’m getting married in a cable car.”

True to my word, I moved to California in 1991, to attend grad school at Mills College, in Oakland. I’ve never left. This “state on the edge / of the continent” is home in ways that Texas, where I was born, never was. I just fit better here. And by here, I mean Northern California, the Bay Area. California is a state of contradictions, good and bad, but I love it in spite of its faults. I hold both. That to me is the definition of home. (Oh, I did not get married on cable car, at least not yet.)

This poem¹ was chosen by California Poet Laureate Lee Herrick and the California Arts Council for the “Our California” project, where he invited poets to write about their California. The poems are divided by county and you can find mine under Contra Costa.

I also subscribe to

100 Poems

by

Lisa Jensen

. This week her poem “Manifesto” and prompt is about why we write poetry. It’s worth reading her poem and the comments. As for me

I write poetry to save my life
   again 
          and again 
                  and again

1. Our California, 2024, California Arts Council, capoetlaureate.org/ourcalifornia