Justice Hobbs was researching a future article about Emmett Jordan’s contributions to the success of the Colorado Water Foundation recently:

OUT HERE

(in celebration of Emmett Jordan and his foundational role in designing the publications of the Colorado Foundation for Water Education 2003-2015)

Out here, on the high plains,

I marvel at the water trickle
a windmill flows,

All the possibilities,
all the dreams,
a hundred years or so—

To the south,
a forgotten cemetery

cows now graze

Claims a handful of
nameless homesteaders—

to the west, a ditch

That never carried
more than dreams
of irrigation bounty—

To the north, the waterless
Keota water tower—

to the east, the ruined

Grasslands of
“Government Ground”
busted into lost 160s—

New directions
brittle foundations
squeezed from the planet—

Pardon my ramblings.
In the rhythm of the rivers,

the west finds its most treasured experience.

Thank you, Emmett!

Poem “Out Here” by Greg Hobbs and Emmett Jordan published in Colorado Mother of Rivers, Water Poems (Colorado Foundation for Water Education 2005, designed by Emmett Jordan).  Photos by Greg Hobbs 5/3/2015