Baytown

Milton Jordan

February 25, 2024

We arrived in June five months after

two towns and that unincorporated

settlement farther up the Channel

merged after a clamor over names,

diehard townies holding out for their own,

but neither Goose Creek nor Pelly expressed

the proper image of progress.

The rescued community of boomers

gathered around the refinery gate,

welcomed the prospect of good pay

but cared little for naming the place,

simply shrugged when theirs was chosen,

and those towns’ names appear now on tee shirts

stubborn residents wear for Old Timers Days.

Milton Jordan lives with Anne in Georgetown, Texas. He co-edited the first Texas Poetry Assignment anthology, Lone Star Poetry, Kallisto Gaia Press, 2022.