POETRY  -  
​     WITH THE THEME OF WORK    

S. F. Public Transit  -   photo by Mike Lambert                                    

SIC TRANSIT GLORIA
by Kathy Gilbert

​Is public transportation
a business or a service?
President of the Board
asked why we couldn’t run
BART like his PGE. Twenty
years later that’s a tee-hee-hee.
At least we didn’t burn down
San Bruno or Paradise.
 
MUNI got the same complaints
over & over & over:
 The bus/streetcar/cable car
was late. Never showed.
Kid couldn’t graduate.
You’re too tardy and slow.
             To answer, instead, we instructed
                      via Public Information Letters,
 
PILS for short
to dispense with the belly-
aching. First, apologize.
Second, give an overview:
                           Line delay, wires down,
                           Equipment/operator shortage.
Third, end with the bromide:
May your future travels be
pleasant and uneventful,
Enclose a token for a free ride.
Sign.

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​Kathy Gilbert received her MFA from San Francisco State University in 2013 after a career in public transport. She received the Mark Linenthal Poetry Award in 2012 from SFSU and won the San Francisco Browning Society Gita Specker Award three times for her dramatic monologues. She was commissioned to write a play for the 2015 San Francisco Olympians Festival. Her one act Delphin and the Children of Amphitrite was performed at the Exit Theater. She also tutors third graders, studies tai chi, practices yoga and swims. Her new book Aprils Three: Poems and Photographs is now available locally at Bird & Beckett, West Portal Books, Green Apple on Clement and on Amazon. 

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