Page 237
By Jack Joseph Smith
By Jack Joseph Smith
Original Scan
AI Interpretation
Ya Got To Get Up turns hogs, hawks, a blank windowpane, and a corner cat into a harsh instruction to wake, grieve cleanly, and write with wilderness caution.
Country hogs and city hawks collapse different worlds into the same command: listen. The poem keeps sorting bad dream, nightmare, and grief, insisting that grief is the pure thing among them. Writing becomes an act of survival, something done slowly and warily because the night has already stripped away the crowd that once came.
'Ya' Got To Get Up': hawks on city streets and country hogs as listening gauges; bad dream distinct from nightmare; window of ware reflecting nothing; 'get up and write / a line, be careful, and do it slow as if it is in the wilderness.'