DC Poets: José Padua

In the Valley of the Bobs

There’s nothing more frightening

than a man named Bob. Not a day

goes by when I don’t think, Bob is

coming to get me. Not a motion passes

before my tired eyes when I don’t think,

Bob Bob Bob. I hear the sound of Bob’s

footsteps two blocks away, walking

up my street, going up to my front

porch, knowing that when he gets

to my door he won’t bother to knock.

When I was a kid there were menacing

Bobs in my neighborhood, guys who

I knew had knives in their back pockets

or guns in their Bob-sized boots. Bob X.

was not my friend, nor was Bob Y, nor

was Bob Z, and I’m not talking about Bob

Dylan who was always really a Robert

not a Bob. But those Bobs couldn’t get

close to me the way the Bobs can today.

It wasn’t me who ripped Bob off,

but that doesn’t matter to Bob. He

doesn’t care who did what or where

or why because this is Bob’s world now

and the hills are alive with the sound

of Bob’s pissed-offness. I see those hills

bouncing as if they were bulls in the rodeo,

tossing cowboys off their backs. I see them

bobbing for Bob against the bold blue sky

while he eats his morning bacon. It is summer

and the Bobs are taking back the country.

It is summer and the Bobs are just around

the corner, singing their horrible songs,

holding out their hands as I look straight ahead

holding my head up like a statue, walking

a line like a robot watching his step. This is

how I live here in the valley of the shadow,

in the valley of the Bobs, staring at the Bobs

as they look away, as they stop to ask questions,

as the robins stretch their wings, and rise

from the ground like malevolent angels

because everyone and everything is afraid

and the next Bob is around the corner,

counting fingers, eyes, hands, souls.

José Padua’s poetry, fiction, and nonfiction have appeared in publications such as Bomb, Salon, the Brooklyn Rail and Washington City Paper as well as the New York Times and anthologies like Up is Up, but So Is Down: New York's Downtown Literary Scene, 1974-1992. After living in big cities like Washington and New York all his life, he now lives in the small town of Front Royal, Virginia, where he and his wife, the poet Heather Davis, write the blog Shenandoah Breakdown [shenandoahbreakdown.wordpress.com].