This Day
by Jimmy Santiago Baca

I feel foolish,
        like those silly robins jumping on the ditch boughs
        when I run by them.
                Those robins do not have the grand style of the red tailed hawk,
                no design, no dream, just robins acting stupid.
They've never smoked cigarettes, drank whiskey, consumed drugs
as I have.
                In their mindless
                fluttering about
                filled with nonsense,
                they tell me how they
                        love the Great Spirit,
                scold me not to be self-pitying,
                to open my life
                and make this day a bough on a tree
                leaning over infinity, where eternity flows forward
                and with day the river runs
                        carrying all that falls in it.
                Be happy Jimmy, they chirp,
                Jimmy, be silly, make this day a tree
                leaning over the river eternity
                and fuss about in its branches.