Almost every day, he said, my
glass seemed more than half full,
but a fly would dance on top. When
we came into home, winging away
from sunset, I saw one cloud-like
nuclear explosion. My trip's
symbolic, beautiful resolution.
57/100
A recent sit on the porch yielded too many “morning” poems for one day. Herewith…
I sat in morning's glory:
Sun on my left shoulder.
Squirrels, possessed, scampered below,
imitating smaller chipmunks.
Finches swooped from roof
to feeder, then returned.
One belligerent wren whistled
insistently. Towhee sang softly,
Wren's backup singer.
Suddenly bird-laughter through
dense pines. Pileated woodpecker
taunted from his shadowy
safety, hidden. Sun limned
dawn's clouds, painted our laurel.
I wondered: could daytime meet
My morning's grand promises?
30/100
Every day I’m posting one poem for 100 days…or attempting to. August will tell the tale. So far I’ve navigated a couple of things which could have derailed me, including a broken arm last Tuesday evening. I’m reminded of the supposed Jerry Seinfeld mantra: “Don’t Break The Chain.” Seinfeld claimed it wasn’t his idea, but oddly, the show Seinfeld had an episode about it. The legend is that Seinfeld was at something (it’s been attributed to an open mike night/interview type of thing) and was asked what advice he would give to an aspiring comedian. His supposed answer was, “Every day write one joke. And don’t…break…the…chain!”
BAROMETER HEAD
Tunes atmosphere
Hears what no one
else can. Predicts
rain. Suffers through
hurricanes, his
head poundingly
painful. Displays
unnatural giddiness
during sunny
high pressure domes.
Can't leap tall buildings,
Can't stop bullets,
(but his sinuses
sometimes feel as
if they've done so).
His kryptonite?
Nasal sprays which
would destroy his
power, inure him
to those swirly
times when colors
speak, spoken words
seem tangible,
when he walks inside
his waking dreams.
24/100
Every day a poem:
Dawn's introductory stanza
Sets me up—better, worse, or
In-between. By Breakfast's lines
Attitude starts setting, casting
Today's foundation. Theme, style,
music, tone, harmony, dissonance,
all proscribed by this early start.
Takes composer's interference to
Change this line, this development.
Afternoon either resolves all notes,
or abandons them to dissipate into
"well there's always tomorrow."
8/100
On March 2nd, the dawn struck the city first…
…and slowly made its way across the Matanzas River toward us…
Traffic into the city (and drivers) snarled every time the drawbridge rose…
Florida shorebirds used the shifting shadows to hide their predation…
Some worked the waters together…amicably or not…
After a “look to the East” one craves liquid refreshments. St. Augustine obliged. Meanwhile, the day drew to a close…
The same boats illumined at dawn changed in the reddening skies…
Night descended. The Bridge of Lions looked similar to the previous night, but not the same…
Lights from The Bridge of Lions danced across the water as we headed to bed. Goodnight, St. Aug. Thanks for the day…
We returned from our afternoon in Colmar, dined, and watched the sun set as we sailed north toward one of the many locks on the Rhine. I stayed up to watch, but the night grew later…
I managed to catch the first lock before bed beckoned beyond my ignoring it. I always cringe when I lean over a railing holding a smartphone to take a photo. I’m sure I’m going to watch an expensive tool/toy go “plop!” into the waters (or rocks) below.
Heading downstream, the ship entered full locks which then drained before the ship continued its journey through the night.
At that point the clock chimed 10 p.m. and I headed to bed. Some of the folks stayed on the top deck through midnight and beyond as more locks were negotiated. The novelty never wore thin—any night which promised locks, a gathering topside seemed in order. If this appeals to you, I recommend booking in the May-September timeframe when temperatures support being outside comfortably. Even with temperatures in the 90’s during the afternoon, nights got very cool: by morning all but the really hardy wore a sweater or light jacket.
Santa Fe, New Mexico!
This past week we journeyed to Santa Fe, NM, where my brother has lived for about four years. This represented our last chance to do so, because he plans to relocate to a different state next year. Although our first two visits in 1996 and to my brother’s house in 2022 left us unimpressed with the city and its surrounds, I found my attitude changing this time. I think taking a more relaxed approach to each day helped, plus I’ve slowly decompressed over the past five years of retirement. My past as a Road Warrior for several years took a big hit when we all sat around in 2020 during the Covid pandemic. It kicked into gear again in 2021 and hadn’t dissipated by 2022. For whatever reason, we found ourselves hitting a few museums, seeing familiar sights, finding some new ones, and spent late afternoons in conversation prior to dining out every night. (Dining out might have aided our feeling of “vacation”.)
A few representative photos:
We visited the Georgia O’Keeffe museum Wednesday, a must stop because we had missed it in 2022 when our only day to do so turned out to be the day it closed. Out of deference for the artist I won’t reproduce her work here, although photos were allowed. Similarly I won’t reproduce the artwork I photographed at the Wheelwright Museum of the American Indian on Friday, October 3rd.
We ate New Mexican style food at Escondido, La Choza, and a super-high-end place called Sazón in downtown Santa Fe. On the 2nd we ate Indian at Paper Dosa, a restaurant we had seen on Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives (Food Network). Mostly I will remember north central New Mexico like this:
Our first morning aboard the Viking Hlin, I woke early. Apparently three evenings of my patented jet lag adjustment routine (copious amounts of beer, large amounts of food, and moderate exercise) had done the trick. I left my barely awake wife in the stateroom and wandered the early dawn on the top deck. Something about boats and trains indulges the romantic. He wakes happy that someone else has navigated the vessel to a new location while he slept. His sleepy dreams continue when the curtains are drawn: what will I see? Where am I? This occurs in a manner no plane will ever match with its tube-through-time approach to travel.
Turning to the starboard side of the deck, the barely risen sun illuminated a nice cathedral in Breisach, still mostly in shadows.
After realizing our definition of ‘breakfast’ would forever be altered by our onboard experience, we headed out on a bus ride to and through the Black Forest. Its history was narrated capably by our erudite and dryly humorous guide, Johannes, raised in the Black Forest. It reminded me of certain challenging terrains in North America where high foothills exist prior to the Rocky Mountains or the North Cascades (primarily on the lee side of the mountains). Unfortunately, the polarized windows of the bus, and the fact my wife sat in the window seat, made photography impossible.
Next post: a ‘typical’ Black Forest village.
It’s been a lengthy stretch of sporadic posting at best. I’ve excused it with “spending time with my wife” and “getting things done” which certainly sound worthy. We’ve just returned from attending her mother’s funeral. (More on that later.) A slate of urgent tasks demands my attention, as does maintaining my health, both physical and mental.
A few pieces of writing, stubs and nothing more, await more attention than I can manage right now. Today let’s just review the two-plus weeks since I posted a hawk in our front yard. Hawks continue to drop by, a vivid affirmation to our decision to rip out the front lawn and install native plants—and especially to my decision to let the leaves lie where they fall. The leaf cover has fostered those little grubs and bugs birds like eat and extends to small rodents for the hawks.
Sadly, rodents (squirrels) ripped into the blossoms of our star magnolia. This is as good as it ever looked this spring:
Perhaps the false starts to spring affected it? We had days in the 70’s and hit 80 once before cold weather set in again, complete with dustings of snow and some freezing rain. The cold became brutal for North Carolina, dropping into the teens. This delayed the magnolia’s blooming by two weeks or more. It looked like this last year, weeks earlier:
We revisited the Duling-Kurtz Country Inn in Exton, PA, Sunday evening. Sitting up by the fire that evening pleased us both. Dressing for the funeral in this room made things marginally better than performing the same in a generic Hilton or Marriott property.
We’re on the eve of a personal holiday, Opening Day of Baseball. The joy baseball brings will temper the immediate sorrow of losing our last parent. This year promises many highs and lows, a challenge from start to finish. “May you live in interesting times.” Indeed.
all the voices in my head 