Jim Skiff Poetry

09/12/2026

The Middle of the Wall

it is the working season
daylight ripens like corn
skin grows golden
watered with sweat
walls grow like days
stone by stone
each whole unto itself
patterns emerge
when seen from a distance
mortar flows from my trowel
like words from my tongue
this liquid music
that binds and holds
father's face
furrowed and brown
is only seen
when we meet
in the middle of the wall

Jim Skiff
26 July, 1984
image created with Meta AI
words by Skiffy

09/12/2026

Truth is Immutable

Truth is immutable, facts are certain,
You may wish them away or strike a bargain,
Dispute or refute them, they stay the same.
You may call them lies or call them names.
They refuse to change when you raise your voice,
Or bully them into another choice.
Kill the messenger, his message remains
Fire the scientist, the science stays.
Discount the accountant at your expense,
The bank will always collect on your debt.
Pretend any half-assed deception you like,
If you listen to fools and take their advice,
As you've sown, you shall reap your enduring fate.
You may run and hide, but never escape .

Jim Skiff
8/3/26

09/12/2026

Not in Kansas Anymore

There comes a moment when you comprehend.
Your relevance has never really been
Of much concern to anyone but you,
Your family, perhaps, and a few friends.
The values, you once thought, were held by all,
Were nothing but a temporary trend.
Manipulated to enchant, enthrall,
And motivate to pay a dividend
To those who pose as Providential Source.
Captains of Industry, the Church and State,
Who claim to have our best interests at heart
As long as we all fill the offering plates.
The only thing I know that is certain,
Do not trust the men behind the curtain.

Jim Skiff
8/25/26

09/12/2026

The Language of the Wind

When you speak the language of the wind
Your words are invisible
Some look up
They sense a change in the room
A faint, rustling breeze perhaps,
From where, they do not know
Refreshed, they resume their life
They felt something stir
For a moment

When you speak the language of the wind
Your words are a balm and a zephyr
Kicking up sand in tiny whirlwinds
Cooling the sweat soaked skin of laborers
Lifting the skirts of women having coffee
In the Piazza
They smooth them back down
Feeling flushed
And vaguely aroused, they smile
Remembering a former lover

When you speak the language of the wind
Your words are fierce, ceaseless, implacable,
A hurricane of feeling, slowly spinning
Drenching the thirsty earth
Torrential, unrelenting, inexorable
A flood that lifts and destroys
Uprooting trees
Crushing houses in your wake
Survivors cling to metaphors
Praying for rescue

When you speak the language of the wind
Thoughts soar like Hawks
Spiraling in the clear, blue shimmer
Of a summer day
Diving in steep, sudden free-fall
To pluck a fat mouse
From the fields of the oblivious
Concealed in the upper branches
Of a Frazier Fir
You dine with gusto

When you speak the language of the wind
You sometimes wait
Becalmed, stilled, foundered
Adrift in a sea of the mundane
You lick a finger and hold it up
Searching for a Westerly
Until a sudden squall
Descends from nowhere
And fills your sail
With the language of the wind.

Jim Skiff
8/26/26
Image by NFT Art

09/12/2026

Ethereal Navigation

How did ancient people build these structures,
Without the tools that we possess today?
We theorize, unlimited slave labor
Kept Gravity and Natural Law at bay.
What if we are asking the wrong questions,
Assuming humans did these deeds alone?
And further, by illogical extension,
Somehow they moved these massive blocks of stone?
Perhaps cymatic frequencies were channeled,
Through lines of ley within the Living Earth.
The whirling crystal core beneath the mantle
Helped lift and shape and set their final berth;
Aligned with celestial configuration
To assist in Ethereal navigation.

Jim Skiff
9/2/26

09/12/2026

The Love Dimension

Lest there be any misapprehension
I choose to live in the love dimension.
I do not fear what I don't understand
Or wish for opposing views to be banned.
If you need help, I will do what I can
To assist you and try to lend a hand.
I share a real responsibility
For every member of humanity.
I give money to beggars on the street
And think good thoughts for most people I meet.
Some call me crazy, others think me naieve.
This is what my folks raised me to believe.
For some it is difficult to conceive
It is better to give than to receive.

Jim Skiff
9/9/26

08/11/2026

Break the Shell

I take my cues from the natural world.
My life exudes, extends, enfolds, unfurls.
A swirling dance of whirling give and take,
In widening gyres, asleep, awake.
My spirit, ever reaching toward the Light,
In pulsing waves, expand, contract, despite
My keenest efforts at comprehension,
Resistance seems to foil my intentions.
Or, it may provide a necessary friction.
Although it often seem a contradiction.
In order to attain its' destiny
Each seed musters potentiality
Into a unique force that then propels
True essence to enlarge and break the shell.

Jim Skiff
8/11/26

07/30/2026

Happy Birthday Jonathan! Dave Moulton, who produced and engineered my first album, Flower and Sword for Icarus Records in 1977-78 produced and engineered an album with Jonathon in the seventies as well!

Happy 80th birthday to Jonathan Edwards, the voice behind "Sunshine."

Born July 28, 1946, in Aitkin, Minnesota, and raised in Virginia, Edwards picked up a guitar in his teens and never really put it down. His 1971 debut single became an accidental classic. A track on his first album got erased during recording, so he wrote "Sunshine" to fill the gap, playing every instrument himself since his bandmates had already gone home. It climbed to No. 4 on the Billboard Hot 100, sold over a million copies, and turned a quiet protest song into a radio staple that still gets played today.

What's remarkable is that Edwards never chased the hit again. He drifted toward straight country, then folk, then bluegrass, releasing more than a dozen albums over five decades and touring well into his later years. He wasn't interested in repeating himself. He was interested in writing what felt true.

Eighty years in, his songs still carry that same quiet honesty.

Happy birthday, Jonathan! Thank you for the sunshine.

07/29/2026

more from 1984

now can you understand
the incestuous cycle of ceremony
perpetuated upon all sentient beings
by virtue of intellection?
this mad satire on the poetry of ideas
distorting them through seared, smoked glass
reality rippling and curving
like flesh and water and excrement
s**t needs no definition
nor water
nor flesh
the mind is removed
discussion, but a masque
for the elemental waves
breaking on foreign shores
the heart listening, patiently
for the faint echoes' return

jim skiff
27july1984