Would the real Seamus Heaney please stand up?
I only wish I could see the two of them face each other down on the slam stage.

Now then: I have been unable to stop listening to Hot Hot Heat's self-titled album. First listen had me making the what-did-I-buy face but by track 10 I had the thing on repeat entire. What's happening to me? I must plug myself into Zappa & the Mothers Live in London before I do something awful. Like buying the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. On vinyl.

Today:
I shall acquire more lesbian campfire music.
The collage for Megan was left at home. Wait for Monday. We see as through a scanner darkly.
Lunch will be la Teresita - Cuban greasy spoon. Mmmm plantains.
I am making up for yesterday's no-coffee regimen as fast as possible.
Mundanity!
Profanity!
Bad 80's videos!

There will be time enough and world for quiet and still.

twister

some of us were afraid of sharks because of jaws
bigger than our own, and the movie. for others
spiders or boogie mans or shadows or monsters did it.

but for my brother and i, it was the UPS truck.
i'm telling you the hulk of that brown metal, the open
door a man could fall from, viewing legs with hair

that waved in the wind from the backseat of our station--
wagon we covered our eyes. we didn't care
if our presents from grandma came from those trucks.

we wanted to bury them in the backyard like soldiers.
(that's another thing. soldiers. we killed them in wars
and then buried them. not like other kids, who kill

the same figures over and over. we knew dead was
dead, and once was enough to make a poor guy die,
so we buried em all in rows marked with starbursts,

we cared that much.) we'd dig a hole big enough for a truck
but halfway through the project mom got mad and said
if we dug any deeper we had to throw all our toys

in the hole and fill in the hole. so that stopped us.
same day, the UPS man brought a box of cookies
from five states away, aunt vanessa, and i moved on

to a bigger fear. tornadoes. woke screaming,
dizzy, thinking we were swept into the air and who knew
when we'd be bashed down, my blood so noisy i thought

the freight train sound that came with a tornado.
after the seventh night my father carried me kicking
scratching to the backyard and turned on the light.

the trees wore dark clothes. porch eerily cool and the mint without moths.
no tornadoes. i didn't know whether to be more afraid
that there weren't any, or that there might be any time.

-- Deborah Brandon

My first commissioned work of art. Thank you so much!
(As long as patronage is this friendly and lovely and such an honor I would like to do it forever. A good reason to become wealthy.)

ad homonym

The Waking
Theodore Roethke
1948

I strolled across
An open field;
The sun was out;
Heat was happy.

This way! This way!
The wren's throat shimmered,
Either to other,
The blossoms sang.

The stones sang,
The little ones did,
And flowers jumped
Like small goats.

A ragged fringe
Of daisies waved;
I wasn't alone
In a grove of apples.

Far in the wood
A nestling sighed;
The dew loosened
Its morning smells.

I came where the river
Ran over stones:
My ears knew
An early joy.

And all the waters
Of all the streams
Sang in my veins
That summer day.

***
The Waking
Theodore Roethke
1953

I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
I feel my fate in what I cannot fear.
I learn by going where I have to go.

We think by feeling. What is there to know?
I hear my being dance from ear to ear.
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.

Of those so close beside me, which are you?
God bless the Ground! I shall walk softly there,
And learn by going where I have to go.

Light takes the Tree; but who can tell us how?
The lowly worm climbs up a winding stair;
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.

Great Nature has another thing to do
To you and me, so take the lively air,
And, lovely, learn by going where to go.

This shaking keeps me steady. I should know.
What falls away is always. And is near.
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
I learn by going where I have to go.

oh, yes

there are worse things than
                being alone
                but it often takes decades
                to realize this
                and most often
                when you do
                it's too late
                and there's nothing worse
                than
                too late.

-- Charles B.

I've been other places today.

Mi espejo no refleja. La espera es larga. Y aun estoy sentada aqui: llada asi. Me despido a mi misma en mi silencio que grita por una existencia mas tangible. Estoy aqui, estoy aqui. Mirame. Espero el regreso del reflejo.

So my birthday is coming up, and what with moving and all I'll need something for the walls. I'm particularly partial to posters. (Edit: oh bother. nevermind.)

Losing Track

Long after you have swung back
away from me
I think you are still with me:

you come in close to the shore
on the tide
and nudge me awake the way

a boat adrift nudges the pier:
am I a pier
half-in half-out of the water?

and in the pleasure of that communion
I lose track,
the moon I watch goes down, the

tide swings you away before
I know I'm
alone again long since,

mud sucking at gray and black
timbers of me,
a light growth of green dreams drying.

-- Denise Levertov

Checking in after quite the analog weekend; we know we're in trouble when the dial-ups fail, but at least half the packing is done! [My dear B: Email that story to your editor this morning. Remind me to get in touch with the Boston Globe guy in Sarasota] Getting back into the swing of things with black ink in cups and Peter Howard. L back from France tonight, M to Ireland on Thursday (a month together and we got no time alone, my fault, I know). No sharing of house, big as it is. How now for the week to come? Content.