Morning at the Jetty

Between the deluge
and the storm to come,
I pause to praise the blue
leaking through dank clouds.

Praise too, the pelicans
diving for breakfast,
the neighbors who wave hello,
fishermen casting lines
into the roiling sea below.

Between the deluge
and the storm to come,
I praise this life as given,
to quell my daily fear
the worst may yet appear.

* 

Progress (Post Intraocular Surgery)

The fruit flies
I swat from my eyes

are smaller sized
than the house flies

from yesterday, which
were smaller sized

still than the crows
from the day before.

*

Donna Hilbert’s latest book is Enormous Blue Umbrella, Moon Tide Press, 2025. Work has appeared in journals and broadcasts including Eclectica, Gyroscope, Rattle, Sheila Na Gig, ONE ART, Cholla Needles, TSPoetry, VerseDaily, Vox Populi, The Writer’s Almanac, anthologies including Boomer Girls, The Widows’ Handbook, The Poetry of Presence I & II, The Path to Kindness, The Wonder of Small Things, Love Is For All Of Us, What the House Knows, Poetry Goes The Movies. She writes and leads workshops from her home base in Long Beach, California.