5.3 miles
franklin loop
27 degrees
snow / 100% snow-covered
Before my run, looking out the window, I noticed it was snowing. Of course I went out; it’s fun to run in the snow! Wore my yaktrax for the first time. No problems. A great run. I felt strong and happy to be outside by the river, which was still open with only a few clumps of ice. I was able to run on the walking trail the entire time.
10 Things
- good morning Dave!
- Daddy Long Legs called out to me: good work!
- the shore’s edge across the river, where the snow was collecting, was glowing white. I think the blurry view due to the falling snow made it glow even more
- footprints in the snow, a few of them smeared — is there where someone slipped?
- intense smell of weed on the bridge
- park — or city? — workers parked on the bike path — flashing lights and one worker dropping a hose down somewhere
- a chain across the entrance to the old stone steps
- a few of lights were lit on the lake street bridge, most were still out, their wires stolen
- no eagle perched on the dead branch near the lake street bridge
- a soft, quick crunch as my feet struck the snowy path
Nearing the turn off for the Franklin bridge I deliberated: the franklin loop, or down the hill? I had this strange feeling that the choice mattered. Choosing wrong might mean slipping on an icy path, or worse. I guess I chose right, or my worries were unfounded.
the view from my windows (10:21 am)
2 pairs of windows — one set in front of me, 1 set to the right side. Today it is snowing — only flurries. The grass is half covered in yesterday’s dusting, the sidewalks are white. A few scraggly trees — almost off my front right edge: a pussy willow tree and beyond that a tall, wide trunk — too tall to see the top without moving forward in my chair. 20 or 30 minutes ago, someone walked by with a dog. Now, an empty sidewalk.
Wendell Berry’s Windows poems
Berry has 27 short-ish window poems. Before my run, I read 10 of them. Here are a few notes/thoughts/lines:
1
window as wind’s eye looking out through the black frame
eye as window (to the soul)
winter: white sky, snow squalls, corn blades
2
fall: foliage has dropped/below the window’s grave edge
bare sky, greenness gone, buds asleep in the air
the hard facts: the black grid of the window
3
40 panes, 40 clarities
window glass streaked with rain, smudged with dust
wild graph of its growth
the window is a form of consciousness
window mind wild consciousness river wind blown seed cobwebs
4
this is the wind’s eye,/Wendell’s window
In the low room/within the weathers,/sitting at the window,
the spark at his wrist/flickers and dies, flickers/and dies
5
Look in/and see him looking out.
hill (the native hill?) — wears a patched robe/of some history that he knows/and some that he/does not
the cattle watch him from the distant field
but there are mornings
when his soul emerges
from darkness
as out of a hollow in a tree
high on the crest
and takes flight
with savage joy and harsh
outcry down the long slope
of the leaves.
What he has understood
lies behind him
like a road in the woods. He is
a wilderness looking out
at the wild.
6
third person: as the man works
the window, alive: the window/staring into the valley/as though conscious
dreariness as comfort: As the man works/the weather moves/upon his mind, its dreariness/a kind of comfort
7
birds learn to trust him, then ignore him: That they ignore him/ he takes in tribute to himself.
birds as free — reckless with their eating, not concerned with the high cost of seeds
8
the river rises, nears the window
a storm, out of the corner of his eye, troubles the working Wendell
9
outside, birds: the air is a bridge/and they are free
Berry/writer is
set apart
by the black grid of the window
and, below it, the table
of the contents of his mind:
notes and remnants,
uncompleted work,
unanswered mail,
unread books
–the subjects of conscience,
his yoke-fellow,
whose whispered accounting
has stopped one ear, leaving him
half deaf to the world.
Some pads of paper,
eleven pencils,
a leaky pen,
a jar of ink
are his powers. He’ll
never fly.
10
a rainstorm/flood — what a beautiful description here!
The window
looks out, like a word,
upon the wordless, fact
dissolving into mystery, darkness
overtaking light.
the water recedes:
Facts emerge from it:
drift it has hung in the trees,
stranded cans and bottles,
new carving in the banks
First, the line, facts emerge from it, reminds me of another poem about a time after the rain, After the Rain/Jared Carter:
After the rain, it’s time to walk the field
again, near where the river bends. Each year
I come to look for what this place will yield –
lost things still rising here.
Second, I’m struck by how Berry is using the window to talk about being a writer. I need to read and think about it some more before I say anything else, but it has to do with contrasts between wild and conscious/aware, interior and exterior, looking and being looked at, the word as constructed/fact and the wordless as mystery.
As I read Berry’s words, I keep thinking about Mary Oliver and her discussion in The Leaf and the Cloud about the tensions between writing a poem and being in and of the world.
