{"id":619,"date":"2012-07-02T07:41:08","date_gmt":"2012-07-02T15:41:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/anitra.net\/word\/?p=619"},"modified":"2012-07-02T16:07:04","modified_gmt":"2012-07-03T00:07:04","slug":"uncle-bob","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/anitra.net\/word\/uncle-bob\/","title":{"rendered":"There is Joy: A poem for Uncle Bob Santos"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bob Santos<\/a> is a long-time community activist and public service official in Seattle. As the Northwest Representative for HUD during the Clinton administration,, he worked enthusiastically with homeless organizing groups, and among other things opened the first homeless shelter in a Federal building. He left HUD with the change in administration, but is still working to start new housing projects. The members of WHEEL homeless women’s organization are not the only ones to call him “Uncle Bob”. He is one of the few community leaders trusted by both activists and elected officials.<\/em><\/p>\n

At the party for Uncle Bob’s leave-taking fom HUD, a very large room was packed. There was a wall full of panels displaying his accomplishments, the housing he’d seen built. There was a lot of laughter, a lot of tears.<\/em><\/p>\n

I wrote this poem for that occasion, as WHEEL<\/a>‘s gift to Uncle Bob.<\/em><\/p>\n

\n

There is joy
\nin the hard work, the long hours,
\nthe bone-deep tired,
\nwhen you see their faces,
\npeaceful, happy,
\nrested.
\nThere is joy
\nin the risk, the challenge,
\nwhen your soul in the mirror
\nis at peace, rested,
\nwhole.<\/p>\n

There is grief in parting.
\nWe carry each other’s hearts
\nin our treasure chest
\nto share with friends we look for in the future;
\nBut we will miss the people
\nthat our people will become
\nover time
\nall the time between.<\/p>\n

Our grief will not drown the past.
\nIts well will water the growth of the future;
\ndeep, dark and rich with the weight of memories
\nto lay at the roots of new growth.<\/p>\n

Some souls risk all
\nfor life,
\nfor the lives of others.
\nThey have faces like yours;
\nalive with growth,
\nrich with memory,
\nwith a whole wide soul open in them
\nand joy.<\/p>\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bob Santos is a long-time community activist and public service official in Seattle. As the Northwest Representative for HUD during the Clinton administration,, he worked enthusiastically with homeless organizing groups, and among other things opened the first homeless shelter in a Federal building. He left HUD with the change in administration, but is still working […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,4],"tags":[82,130],"class_list":["post-619","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-poems","category-writing","tag-uncle-bob","tag-wheel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/anitra.net\/word\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/619","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/anitra.net\/word\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/anitra.net\/word\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/anitra.net\/word\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/anitra.net\/word\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=619"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/anitra.net\/word\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/619\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":624,"href":"http:\/\/anitra.net\/word\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/619\/revisions\/624"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/anitra.net\/word\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=619"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/anitra.net\/word\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=619"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/anitra.net\/word\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=619"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}