3.5 miles marshall loop (cleveland) 71 degrees / 71% humidity
The Saturday tradition continues. Running up the Marshall hill with Scott. Today we barely stopped. The goal for next month: adding a few more blocks at the top and turning at Fairview instead of Cleveland. We talked about Spirit Island and visiting dying grandfathers, maybe for the last time, and old lady assassins and doing a survey of how many people greet with morning vs. good morning.
10 Things
half a dozen thin white streaks on the water under the bridge left by rowing shells
a single rower
the coxswain’s bright white boat, first below the bridge, then parked at the dock (moored?)
red — a passing runner in red shoes and red shorts, no shirt
DING dong DING dong DING dong — 8:45 from the St. Thomas bells
a woman walking with 2, or was it 3?, white dogs
thump thwack falling acorns
green — all the traffic lights we encountered — no need to stop!
4 miles minnehaha falls and back 65 degrees wind: 17 mph
Another windy day. I recited a few of my favorite wind lines while I ran — I am the wind and the wind is invisible and Who can see the wind?/Neither I nor you:/but when the leaves hang trembling,/the wind is passing through. Cool, fall-ish. Today the wind sounded like water. It made the leaves fizz and sprinkle and gush like a waterfall, the acorns sounding like a raindrops on a roof
I listened to the wind and the gentle whoosh of the cars on the road as I ran south, stopped at my favorite spot to admire the falls, then put in my headphones and listened to an audio book, Killers of a Certain Age as I ran back north.
Anything else? Gushing falls, a runner in a bright orange shirt, the dirt trail littered with acorn shells, the briefest flash of the river through the thick trees. No roller skiers or big groups of runners or regulars. No frantic squirrels or noticeable bird calls. No geese (yet). No overheard conversations or songs blasting from car radios. No rowers.
In theory (and from a distance), I love bats. Here’s another poem to add to my
I don’t know why I should have woken today remembering it, but I did: 1989, the lights turned down, and we’d locked ourselves in a closet in Goshen, New York, my mother and I, because a bat was trapped in the house. This was before everything—before life before alcohol before madness— and you can imagine what happened next, you can hear her squealing when something touches her shoulder and she realizes it is not my hand, or the hand of my father, and the door bursts open and a woman stumbles through a house praying and thrashing her hands, her nightgown catching on the furniture, and a small thing crouched in a closet, dark and wild and hearing it all, wondering how the hell to get out of there.
this class sounds great!
Found this wonderful course description (I wish I could take the class!) via twitter. It shares some similarities with the course I teach at The Loft:
Delve into the outside world in this six-week course, where we will experiment with mapping the local environment in a variety of poetic forms. From rivers and trees to streets and weather, we will turn our attention to the rhythms of the human and more-than-human world, exploring the role of observation in poetry. Sticks, leaves, crows, graffiti, mud, and cycle paths will all form a part of our poetic investigation. Creative exercises, prompts, and constructive feedback will jolt you into new ways of thinking and writing about your surroundings.
3 big loops* lake nokomis open swim 75 degrees
After yesterday’s choppy swim, I decided to wear a wetsuit. I didn’t really need it, but I liked swimming with the wetsuit. So much higher on the water! Faster. The little bit of chop not bothering me. This was my first wetsuit swim since last summer.
*They must have had a shortage of lifeguards — college kids heading back to school? — because they only had the orange buoys up. The course was a lot shorter. I swam 4 loops, but the distance time number of strokes matched up with a 3 loop swim.
At least 2 menacing swans, nearing from the side. Do they see me? Not sure, but they didn’t hit me. A few wandering canoes and several swimmers deciding to swim this lake like Cedar: going which ever way they wanted.
overheard: a little kid to an open swimmer: hey, do you have a spare pair of googles? the swimmer: sorry, no
Anything else? I think I actually saw a fish — and not just a silver flash — below me. It happened too fast to be freaked out by it.
A great swim. I stopped at 4, thinking that would be enough since Scott was waiting and I’m swimming again tomorrow morning. Should I have done one more loop? Maybe.
Started re-memorizing “Babel” by Kimberly Johnson and was reminded of the first sentence, My God, it’s loud down here, so loud the air/is rattled, as I ran. So loud! The air buzzing, my footsteps amplified. Ran north through the neighborhood, across the lake street bridge, up Marshall hill. I enjoyed passing all the cars waiting for the light to change, wondering if they wished they were me, out in the air, not stuck in a car. Lots of sun, some shade, no shadow. My left hip is a little tight — I think it’s my IT band, which is irritating but not a cause for alarm.
My God, it’s loud: 10 Gorge Things
the electric hiss of cicadas
my footsteps on the asphalt — not a soft strike or a hard thud but something in-between, something loud, almost echoing
deeper breaths
a black-capped chickadee — fee bee fee bee, a blue jay trying to answer back screech screech
water rushing or gushing or just falling at shadow falls
dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong dong (the bells at St. Thomas)
crunch thwak — an acorn popping then flying out from under a car’s wheel
walk walk walk walk — the crosswalk sign at summit and cretin letting me know that I could walk
we’re almost to the bike trail! — a woman biker to the passenger in her bike trailer
He’s the Wiz and he lives in Oz — the refrain from the first song I listened to when my put my headphones in on the bridge
Since I mentioned my IT band, it’s time for another round of fun with injury terms:
I T stands for iliotibial band, but why couldn’t it stand for…
ink tents
impish tattlers
iffy tables
incomplete tarantulas
illuminated truths
ill turtles
Icarus trend
implied tantrum
itemized tally
Italian treat
implacable tree
idiotic toadstool
3 loops lake nokomis open swim 79 degrees
A somewhat chaotic swim. Choppy water with swells. On the way to the little beach, it felt like the water was both pulling me down and washing over me, making it hard to stroke and to breathe. On the way back to the big beach, the swells were bigger — more punching walls of water — and with the sun, it was almost impossible to see any of my landmarks. Also, several kayaks and one swan boat got pretty close to me. And the first green buoy was placed so far to the right that it wasn’t until the third loop that I figured out the right trajectory for swimming past it without needing to correct my course. Even with all that, I enjoyed the swim. It’s always great to be out in the middle of the lake!
My God, it’s loud: 9 lake things
a woman near the lifeguard stand where swimmers leave their bags, talking VERY loudly about her kid and what they were doing at the playground
3 loops and an hour later, that same women still talking VERY loudly near the lifeguard stand
a flock of seagulls, calling out as they flew above the water
a flock of teenage boys, yelling as they played some game at the edge of the swimming area that involved touching something gross at the bottom of the lake
kids playing in the water near the little beach
water sloshing over my head as a wave hit me
water spraying as my hand entered the water and I hit the wave
the lifeguard to the flock of boys: please do not play on the rope!
a general din on the beach from people talking, eating, playing music, laughing
Continued the Saturday tradition of running the Marshall loop with Scott. This morning we ran up the hill between the river road and cretin without stopping. We talked about hospice and last stages of life and Project Runway and band board meetings. Hospice is amazing, by the way. Passed other runners and walkers, tried unsuccessfully to avoid acorns and mud from yesterday’s storm. We weren’t home when it hit, but according to FWA (and many other people on facebook) we got hail the size of quarters. No major damage, but tons of leaves strewn all over the deck, the sidewalk, the road.
10 Things
so many acorns on the sidewalk and the trail! some crushed, some whole — dangerous. Already I’ve rolled a few times on them
a weird whiny bird near shadow falls. Scott wondered if it was a grouse. It might be. I looked it up and listened and the Ontario, 1963 call sounds similar to what we heard today
bright sun, broad daylight, yet the street lamps on the trail are on and so is the lamp on the bridge steps that neither of us have ever noticed before
avoiding sprinklers on Summit
the warning beep from the crosswalk sign in sync with the beat of a song coming out of a car’s radio
on marshall between cretin and cleveland: more shade than sun
the unpleasant whiff of the sewer as we passed near shadow falls
a shell with a single rower in it — watching the oars gently enter the water and leave a trail
getting dripped on once when the wind shook the tree we were running under
crossing the bridge, looking down at the river, seeing a part of the old meeker locks and dam poking through the water
Another late morning run, just before 11. Warm, bright sun. I felt good during my run, not great, but good, especially considering this is my 4th day in a row running. Listened to Taylor Swift’s Lover as I ran south on edmund boulevard and raced a runner on the trail — I’m not sure they knew we were racing, and we weren’t really, it just seemed like it sometimes. When I reached the winchell trail, I took out my headphones and listened to my breathing, my feet striking the debris on the trail — pebbles, acorn shells, mushy mulch, and a few scattered voices from above.
10 Things
the trickle of water out of the sewer pipe at 42nd
a kid calling out above the oak savanna
more trickling near the ravine
thump thump thump — acorns dropping on the pavement
a darting squirrel who noticed me approaching and quickly retreated into the trees
the tree that fell in the ravine in may or june, still there draped across the path
a man peering over the fence on the winchell trail — was he studying the sewer pipe and the water dripping out of it?
a biker speeding down the hill above the tunnel of trees — did he just call out, wheeeee!!
someone in the driveway at the house that posts poems on their front windows
my shadow — I remember that she was dark and sharp, but was she ahead of me or off to the side?
The eye sees only three colors—cardinal in the garden, green bough, blue sky. This morning, a wreck of brightness, not light, but the memory of light. Not red but the memory of flying. Here, a tenderness too bright to look on. White breeze of a blanket settling on a chair. A sequined purse turned disco and shattering the room’s blue air. Someone is moving her lips as someone else speaks opposite. Someone is sleeping in a pickle of light. Above me, outside, the cardinal, walking along the gutter, stops high above my shoulder like a fact that can’t be held. Here, the body undoes itself. The lung, its flutter. The sacrum’s sacred shield. Every red cell. The clouds come and go as themselves. Who says when the body is better? Why should I believe them? Why, this morning, is the eye lidded down, salt-smudged, confusion, watercolor and linen? Can I not be the day’s exception? Do I close my eyes or open them?
I like how she uses color here. Doxorubicin is used in chemo for treating cancers like breast cancer.
swim: 3 loops lake nokomis main swim 78 degrees
A beautiful evening for a swim! I felt fast and strong and buoyant today. No buoy tethered to my torso leaking air and weighing me down. As usual, I saw most of the orange and green buoys (and barely) only just before I reached them. The buoy I could see the best was the first orange one as I swam from the green buoy towards it. Ran into one person — I think it was their fault, but it could have been mine. I don’t remember seeing any minnows or silver flashes or ducks or seagulls or planes. Saw one very menacing sailboat, 2 swans, and a canoe. I mostly breathed every 5 strokes. My nose plug only needed to be adjusted once. My goggle didn’t leak. Hooray!
The water was opaque — light brown? — and not too cold. Not too many swells, no waves washing over me as I tried to breathe.
Remember hearing the sloshing and slapping of water from other swimmers’ hands entering the water when I stopped mid-lake to adjust my nose plug.
Colors: dark green trees, light green buoys and swim caps, pink and yellow safety buoys, orange buoys, red kayaks, white swans, white sails, a white boat’s bottom, a silver roof top, blue sky, brown water, black wetsuits
No reciting poems or interesting thoughts or moments of wonder. Just non-stop effort and a chance to lose track of time.
5 miles bottom of franklin hill and back 78 degrees dew point: 60
Overcast. Cool for the first few minutes, until my body warmed up, then lots of sweat and a flushed face. Running through the tunnel of trees, stillness. The only sounds, my soft feet, my deep breaths. It lasted only for a moment, then the whirr of bike wheels from behind. Everything a deep green, thick. Calm.
Nearing Lake Street, I heard a song coming out of a bike radio that I recognized but couldn’t quite identify. I kept singing (in my head) a familiar line, hoping the song title would come to me. It didn’t. Now I can’t remember the line. Will it pop into my head later today? I hope so. All I can remember from the line is “time.”
Ran all the way to the bottom of the hill listening to soft stillness, the birds, and my body moving above the gorge. Walked back up the hill, put in The Wiz, and started running again.
Noticed the river in the flats: still, brown, stagnant. No rowers or waves or shimmering surface.
As I started to write this entry, I began a Crosby, Stills & Nash playlist. Maybe for the first time, I actually gave attention to the opening lyrics of “Suite: Judy Blue Eyes”:
It’s getting to the point Where I’m no longer fun anymore I am sorry
Wow. Getting older, I feel these lines. I like how blunt and bare they are and how they contrast with the music, which seems softer, less sad.
another definition of poetry
A poem is something that can’t otherwise be said addressed to someone that can’t otherwise hear it. By this definition, poetry is deeply impractical and deeply necessary.
“Ars Poetica: Origin Stories” / Craig Morgan Teicher
Warm, but low humidity. Ran later, at 11:30. Some shade, mostly sun. Ran south on the dirt trail between edmund and the river road. Yesterday it was mostly wet and muddy, today dry and dusty. Crossed over to the river road trail, then down to Winchell just before 44th. I don’t remember much about the river except that it was white and very bright. The trees were green and thick. No leaning trunks today. Also no sleeping bodies passed out on the path.
Listened to more acorns dropping — clink clunk thump — and kids yelling as they biked or played at the playground for most of the run. After ascending the 38th street steps, I put in Taylor Swift’s 1989 and she welcomed me to New York.
10 Things
right before starting to run: a dark brown, almost black, squirrel sitting up on its hind legs — did it have an acorn? I couldn’t tell
pale, dusty dirt on the boulevard path
the squeaky groan of the bed of a big truck tilting down to drop off some type of giant machine on the road
passing by a walker on the narrow winchell trail — right behind you! — as water dripped dripped dripped out of the sewer pipe below
running on the tips of my toes as I traveled up the short, very steep grade near folwell
3 or 4 small stones stacked on the ancient boulder by the sprawling oak tree
passing by the old stone steps that lead to the river, the flash of an idea: why not take these steps down to the river? another flash: bugs, heat, no time to stop. So I didn’t
another groups of kids in yellow vests biking on the trail, the leader/adult calling out, stay on your side of the lane!
doing quick steps to avoid the tree roots just barely sticking out of the dirt on the trail at the top of edmund
listening to the line in Taylor Swift’s “Bad Blood”: Did you have to do this? I was thinking that you could be trusted Did you have to ruin what was shiny? Now it’s all rusted and thinking about shiny vs. rusted, and rust in the fall, then I noticed some rust on one of the big metal tubes all around the neighborhood that the city is using for their sewer work — Scott says these tubes get placed vertically in the ground and the workers stand in them as they do their work
I couldn’t tell one song from another, which bird said what or to whom or for what reason. The oak tree seemed to be writing something using very few words.
I couldn’t decide which door to open—they looked the same, or what would happen when I did reach out and turn a knob. I thought I was safe, standing there, but my death remembered
its date: only so many summer nights still stood before me, full moon, waning moon, October mornings: what to make of them? which door?
I couldn’t tell which stars were which or how far away any one of them was, or which were still burning or not—their light moving through space like a long late train,
and I’ve lived on this earth so long, 50 winters, 50 springs and summers, and all this time stars have stood in the sky—in daylight when I couldn’t see them, and
at night, when most nights I didn’t look.
This idea that stars are there all the time, even in the day when we can’t see them, seems to be (at least in my limited experience) a favorite of poets. Also: the moon!, the fact that stars are dead by the time we see them, so we’re looking at ghosts, and the realization that ponies are not baby horses (I encountered this revelation, sometimes with the annoying phrase, I was today years old when I realized that ponies aren’t baby horses, from poetry people). All of these, sources of wonder and delight. I suppose they are for me, well maybe not the horses/ponies thing.
Currently I’m reading Andrew Leland’s The Country of the Blind and it’s amazing. His descriptions of becoming blind, or being in this state of living while losing sight, not living with lost sight, resonate a lot for me, especially the idea of doubting your own vision loss and his experiences with eye doctors:
(note: I didn’t have time to transcribe this page, but I will come back to do it and put in alt text for others who already can’t see the image, and for me who will soon not be able to.
swim: 3 swell loops lake nokomis open swim 82 degrees
So many swells in the water today. For most of it, I felt like I was being pulled down into the water. Not very buoyant. I wondered if I would able to do 3 loops. But as I got deeper into the swim, I felt stronger and more able to keep going.
10 Things
little minnows near the shore — hello friends!
being rocked — not roughly or gently but in a way that made it difficult to push through the water
getting stuck behind a woman swimming backstroke and getting way off course — is she swimming backstroke? is that the green buoy, way over there?
racing a wetsuit on the back end of the first loop. Did he realize we were racing, or was it just me? I won
the far orange buoy was much closer to the little beach than it has been all season
spotted one swan, no sail boat or wandering canoes
sighting other swimmers by the bubbles their feet made under the water
the orange buoys looked like they had white patches as I got closer to them — the sun was shining extra bright on them, I guess
no birds or planes that I remember but one zooming dragonfly
felt like I was on a people mover for the last stretch between the last green buoy and first orange one — swimming so fast, pushed along by the swells behind me
Recited Mary Oliver’s “Swimming, One Day in August” in my head as I swam the last loop and realized something. She writes:
Something had pestered me so much that I felt like my heart would break. I mean, the mechanical part.
The mechanical part? I realized that her heart breaking is a good thing here and that her mechanical heart is the one that follows the beat of organized, tightly contained time, broken down into hours and minutes and seconds so we can be as efficient and productive as possible. Yes! Swimming in the lake can break me open and out of time’s rigid boxes.
The temperature isn’t that high, but the humidity and dew point are. Now, having finished my run, sitting on my deck, I’m dripping sweat while the trees drip rain from yesterday’s showers. Reminds me of a poem I just memorized, “The Social Life of Water” — All water is a part of other water and All water understands and Puddle has a long conversation with lake about fjord. A line to add? Sweat sings a duet with tree while deck listens.
oh no! Still sitting under the tree, the wind suddenly picked up and it began to rain drips all over my keyboard.
A good run. My left hip felt a little sore or tight. Listened to dropping acorns for most of the run, then put in a playlist for the last mile.
10 Things
Mr. Morning! called out good morning! from across the road — he was on the river road trail, I was running on Edmund. Good morning! I called back
the bright headlights of a truck parked on the wrong side of the street
most of the dirt path was wet, a few parts were muddy, but one stretch was loose, dry sand — how had it avoided the rain? was it sheltered by a big tree?
the river was white through the trees. It waved to me in the wind
the coxswains’ voices — first, a deep one, then a higher-pitched one — drifted up from the river. I tried to find the boats, but I couldn’t — less about my bad vision, more about all the green blocking my view
brushing my elbow against some leaves on the side of the trail — wet, cold, refreshing
a chattering of sparrow lifted from a lawn as I ran by
another regular — the woman with shoulder-length hair who walks and always wears a short sporty skirt with sandals. This might be the first time I’ve seen her this summer
a minneapolis parks riding lawnmower hauling ass on the bike path — wow, those vehicles can go fast!
almost forgot — acorns! thumping the ground every few seconds, littering the trail, some intact others already ravaged by squirrels, crunching under car wheels
The early signs of late summer / coming fall are here: dropping acorns and the dull din of non-stop cricket chirps.
Back home from our short trip to Lake Superior — up North in Minnesota and the UP in Michigan. Hot this morning and crowded. Did the marshall loop with Scott. Ran most of the marshall hill, walked some of the stretch past cretin to cleveland, then again through the St. Thomas campus. I’ve never stopped to walk through this campus. Very nice. Heard the bells twice — at 9:45 and 10. Saw the rowers on the river, encountered a very kind biker, dodged workers on a sidewalk.
a ramble
Pointed out that one of the lamps on the east river trail was on and said to Scott, the lights are on, but nobody’s home. Running up the hill, he started singing Squeeze’s Hourglass:
Take it to the bridge, throw it overboard See if it can swim, back up to the shore No one’s in the house, everyone is out All the lights are on and the blinds are down
Impressive. I suggested that maybe he wasn’t working hard enough if he could sing all of that while running up a hill! He started talking about Squeeze and how they resented this goofy song, then how it was probably their second biggest hit after “Tempted,” which prompted me to remember that I always connect this song with the movie, Reality Bites and the scene when Ben Stiller’s character throws his cigarette into Winona Ryder’s convertible — this song is playing during this scene. Then we started recounting what we remember from the movie, ending with Ethan Hawke’s classic planet of regret line. Ugh! The ultimate gen-x d-bag line.
3.1 miles porcupine mountains, michigan 68 degrees
On vacation with Scott, FWA, and RJP. Scott and I ran from our hotel in Silver City towards the Lake of the Clouds entrance to the Porcupine Mountains. For much of the run, we could glimpse slivers of Lake Superior through the trees. At the half way point we reached a sandy beach. What a lake! I love this remote spot in the UP. Yesterday, RJP and I took a quick dip in completely calm water. Today, waves, whitecaps.
10 Things
avoiding scat on the side of the road, loaded with berries — too small for a bear, too big for deer — coyote? fox? wolf?
wind through the aspens, shimmering or simmering
soft, sandy grit at the edge of the road
a few big trucks barreling by
a landscape dotted with septic tanks
rolling hills — a constant running up then down then up again
a hot sun, beating down
still, then wind from every direction near the water
5 miles bottom of franklin hill and back 65 degrees
What a wonderful morning to be outside! Cooler, sunny, calm.
My new morning routine is to get up, feed the dog, make my coffee, and then sit outside on my deck. Sitting there, I noticed a few birds swooping down from our new gutters. Uh oh — they’re trying to build a nest.
I felt pretty good on my run. Relaxed for the first few miles. Running down the hill, my left hip felt a little tight. Not too bad. Last night, Scott and I talked about signing up for the Oct 2024 marathon, for our 50 birthdays. Can my knees and hips handle it?
Listened to birds, acorns falling from the trees, kids calling out for Dairy Queen for the first half of the run. Put in headphones and listened to “Camelot” on the way back.
At the bottom of the franklin hill, I turned around. As I walked back up the hill, I recorded a few moments from the run:
moment one
Running through the tunnel of trees a few minutes ago a wonderful silence no cars I could hear myself breathing everything still no wind. I was mostly in the moment although every so often a wonder about when a car would come and break the silence cut into my calm.
moment two
approaching the trestle I heard some kids yelling, yeah! dairy queen! another camp group a dozen kids in bright yellow vests as they biked past me one of them chanted, dairy queen! dairy queen!
moment three
as spoke about moment two into my phone a runner passed me looking relaxed graceful his legs rhythmically bobbing up and down mesmerizing
10 Things
a still river
a black shirt dropped near the porta potty
one acorn dropping to the ground from a tree, thud
another acorn being crushed by a bike wheel, crunch!
2 roller skiers, or the same roller skier encountered twice
the Welcoming Oaks wondering where I’ve been
a person asleep under the bridge
a regular — Santa Claus
another regular — Mr. Morning!
a woman ahead of me, a dark shirt strung through the strap of her tank top, flapping as she ran
On this last day of July, a month about water, I want to include this passage from Roger Deakin’s Waterlog:
The following afternoon, under a blue sky fringed white with distant clouds on the horizon, four of us swam in 360 feet of turquoise water in a sheer-sided quarry on Belnahua. The island encricled a huge natural swimming pool, raised above sea level, whose waters were so utterly transparent that when we swam, we saw our shadows far down, swimming ahead of us along the bottom. All around, only yards away, was the deeper blue of the open sea, and the Hebrides: Fladda, Scarba, Jura, Lunga, the Garvellachs (the ‘Islands of the sea’, St. Coumba’s favourite place), Luing, Mull and Colonsay. The light and the skies kept changing all afternoon: from bright blue with distant dazzling clouds to deepening red and gold. Diving from the rocks into the immensely deep, clear, brackish water, intensified the giddy feeling of aquatic flying.
Waterlog / Roger Deakin (237)
I would love to swim here (or near here)– some day in my 50s, I hope. Last week I mentioned possibly seeing my shadow in the water, but barely because the water in the lake is opaque. I remember seeing (and writing about) my shadow in the pool last winter, how it felt like I was flying above the deep end. I love the idea of aquatic flying and the rare times I feel like I’m actually doing it.
swim: 2 loops (4 cedar loops) cedar lake open swim 83 degrees
Always grateful for another swim. Was able to swim on course, even without the buoys. My calves felt a little strange, my nose was a bit stuffed up, but otherwise, a great swim.
Instead of listing 10 things I noticed, here’s the coolest thing of the night: the vegetation stretching up from the bottom of the lake. How tall is it, I wonder? On the last loop, rounding the far orange buoy at Hidden Beach, I swam parallel to the beach, right above the vegetation — is it milfoile? Whatever it is, it’s wonderfully creepy — a pale green, ghostly, reaching up toward the light or my torso. So much of it! When I have more time, I do a little more research about these plants, and try to describe them more too.
a note from Future Sara, 24 june 2026: the milfoil is very bad this year. There is a big patch covering part of the swimming area and the start of the open swim path that is so thick, I could easily imagine a less confident swimmer becoming entangled and drowning. Even with my strong swimming ability, I can’t easily swim through it, which makes swimming beside the white buoys impossible. As one (among many) ways to deal with this milfoil and the anxiety it causes, I’m gathering entries (like this one) by tagging them “aquatic plants,” collecting research, and writing about and around nets, entanglement, vines, threads, webs, strings.
Ran with Scott on the Marshall loop, our new Saturday morning tradition. Passed by a chatting toddler with their parents — Hi! We’re taking a walk with our dog today! Half walked, half ran up the Marshall Hill. Talked about RAGBRAI and a few other things I can’t remember now.
10 Surfaces Run Over
plywood (little bridges covering the water pipes on the sidewalk for the city construction project)
grass
mud
a big squishy pile of muck on the sidewalk — yuck!
cracked concrete
asphalt
dirt
long, slender, brittle branches
leaves
acorns
Speaking of acorns, as Scott and I ran down the hill above Shadow Falls I heard 2 distinctive cracks on the pavement — crack crack. It was 2 acorns falling from the tree. Yep, the first signs of fall always come at the end of July and early August.
No rowers on the river, just little waves. Lots of runners, walkers, and one biking who sped by very close without warning us and another who was much slower and kind, gently calling out on your left as they approached. Oh — and someone hauling ass on an eliptigo. Excellent.
watched / read / said
Watched a replay of Katie Ledecky winning her 6th straight gold in the 800 at the World Championships in Fukuoka. She hasn’t lost this race in 13 years. Wow.
Read (with my eyes) the first few pages of Andrew Leland’s The Country of the Blind. He’s talking about how strange it feels to know that you will go blind. I can relate, even though his condition — retinis pigmentosa — is different than mine. I look forward to reading more of this memoir today.
Also read, this time with my ears: I’m finishing up the wonderful audio book, Symphony of Secrets. A bad title, but an excellent book.
Yesterday, Scott said something that I’ve heard before, but that I found particularly funny. Talking about how some program he was using broke or stopped working or something like that he said: it shit the bed. Then he said, who shits the bed? wetting the bed, I can see, but shitting in it?
Also said: Talking about how frazzled I would be if I listened to audio books at twice the speed, I hesitated and then said, I would be a basket case. As I used it, I knew there must be some bad origin story for this phrase. Yep. It involves WWI soldiers and lost limbs, and that’s all I’ll say.
3.3 miles trestle turn around 71 degrees humidity: 94% / dew point: 67
Hot and steamy today. Went out for my run right after the rain ended. Everything wet, dripping, swampy. Headed north through the tunnel of trees. Noticed a tall, precarious stack of small stones on the ancient boulder. Was passed by a shirtless runner with a bright yellow baseball cap on backwards. For the next five minutes of my run, I watched as his bright yellow head slowly bobbed out of sight. Encountered another biking camp group — 20 or 30 kids in yellow vest on the bike path. Not sure how they were doing it, but they managed to get several cars to honk for them. Turned around at the stairs just past the railroad trestle.
For most of the run it was overcast, but at the very end, as I ran back through the neighborhood, some sun emerged and my shadow joined me. Hello friend!
Listened to 1 biker talking to another — most of it was just out of range, but I heard, I always slow way down there and look carefully, otherwise I keep going, the biking kids, and cars. After turning around, put in headphones. Started with Billie Eilish’s latest song for the Barbie movie, “What Was I Made For,” then was inspired to put on The Wiz and the Tinman’s song, “What Would I Do If I Could Feel?”
I started thinking about my desire to use my runs to help open me up to the world — to feel things deeply and generously. And now, as I write this, I’m thinking about Emily Dickinson’s poem about grief and the formal feeling that comes after it, “After great pain, a formal feeling comes,” which I first posted about on this blog in march of 2021.
10 Wet Things
sidewalk puddles
half my street for a short stretch
the leaves on the sprawling oak tree near the ancient boulder
the edges of the trail
one branch leaning over the trail, brushing my face
my face — from sweaty effort, running through rain-soaked branches, under dripping bridges
the air — hazy, steamy, fog hovering just above the trail
the tip of my pony tail
wheels — bike, car, stroller
mud on the dirt trail, mostly where the ruts are the deepest
This was the daily poem on poems.com. A great winter poem to revisit in January. I love Major Jackson’s poetry.
Pine shadows on snow like a Jasper canvas, if only my pen equaled the downy’s stabbing beak this January morning, her frantic chipping, more resolve than frenzy, to make a feast of beetle larvae, if only my wood-boring eyes could interrogate the known like pillars of sunlight through fast-moving clouds scanning the side of Corporation Mountain where on a distant ridge white plumes dissolve like theories. I cannot hear through winter’s quiet what’s worth saying. Saplings stand nude as Spartans awaiting orders. The entire forest is iced-up and glistening. Sealed in its form, the austere world I’ve come to love beckons, earth runnels soon resurrected into a delirium of streams and wild fields. Till then, branches like black lines crisscrossing the sub-Arctic.
swim: 3 loops (6 cedar loops) cedar lake open swim 92 degrees
A warm night with very little breeze. Not good for cooling Scott off on the shore, but good for me and swimming in calm water. For the first few loops it felt a little harder to breathe — was it the heat? Felt a little sore during this swim — just under my right shoulder.
The coolest thing about my swim: just heading out from shore, swimming over some vegetation, dozens of small fish (much bigger than minnows) swam right below me, almost as if I was acting out Anne Sexton’s poem, The Nude Swim, real — All of the fish in us had escaped for a minute. Were these all of my fish, escaping into the water? Or, were these Sexton’s real fish that don’t mind my fish having escaped? Either way, a super cool image! As I think about it some more, I like imaging these fish as escaping from me — swim free little Sara fish!
added the next morning: Just remembered something else about the swim. Mostly the water was warm, which felt nice when I first entered the water, but as I rounded the far buoy, the one at Hidden Beach, I swam through a few pockets of very cold water, which felt nice after swimming in such hot air.
And the week of heat begins. A few days ago, the high was expected to be 103 on Wednesday. Now just 98. Still too warm. I could feel the heat in my run this morning. Harder to breathe. Even so, running feels better. My knees and hips don’t hurt. Hooray!
Listened to kids and cars and birds for most of the run. Turned on “The Wiz” for the last mile.
10 Things
the energetic din of kids getting dropped off for camp at Dowling Elementary
“Uptown Funk” playing on the playground at Minnehaha Academy — I could hear “too hot” through the trees as I ran past. I wondered if it was the edited version or if some kid might go home tonight singing “hot damn”
passing a woman walk-running with her dog on the short hill down to the south entrance of the winchell trail
as I write this entry on my deck, I can hear one of the kids next door whining or whimpering non-stop inside of their house. I am almost positive it’s a kid, but could it be a dog? wow
the water was a burning white
haze hovers above the water’s surface — it looks so hot!
calling out excuse me and thank you! as I passed 3 walkers spread across the path
flying fast down the hill into the tunnel of trees, everything a blur
up on edmund, farther from the river, hearing the faint voices of rowers
no roller skiers or overheard conversations or regulars
Ran with Scott up to Cleveland, over to Summit, beside St. Thomas, down to the river. Stopped and hiked around the Monument before starting to run again. A nice, relaxed run — we talked about the difficulties of taking care of aging parents, terrible comments online, being able to still smell bland smells but not intense ones, swift carrots in Zelda, and whether or not a person who is completely blind (seeing no light) could run if they were tethered to a guide (pacer).
10 Things
dodging sprinklers
the sound of falling water
wooden ramps covering temporary water pipes on the sidewalk making a dull thud when I ran over them
rowers on the river — 2 8 person shells lined up like they might race
a new favorite view of the river from the east side — under the monument on some jutting rocks, a wide view of the lake street bridge, the blue river, longfellow flats on the west side
roots as makeshift steps
mud on some limestone, small gravel and dry dirt on other limestone
the shshshshuffle of a runner’s striking feet from behind
a woman talking on a phone outside — I support all sorts of things in Minneapolis and I’m a SENIOR!
small decals on the lower corner of an out-of-business restaurant: wine glasses and plates and beer mugs? — I can’t quite remember
While I drank my coffee this morning, I memorized a delightful water poem by Tony Hoagland — The Social Life of Water.
Running is feeling a little better, at least on my knee and hip. Mentally it’s difficult to get back into the effort that continuous running takes. For the first mile or so, I chanted triple berries in my head — strawberry / raspberry / blueberry. It helped. Everything is wet this morning — a quick thunderstorm in the middle of the night. Puddles, dripping trees, mud. Slippery.
Waved at Mr. Walker Sitter — not sitting but walking today, good morninged Mr. Morning!, passed a bunch of kids on bikes in yellow vests with an adult, thanked a man for moving his dog over to the side so I could run by. A few minutes later, saw something on the winchell trail ahead of me — a puddle? a tree branch? No, a blue tent wrapped up and around a supine body — two bare legs sticking out wearing hiking boots. Not moving. Were they asleep? passed out? dead? Why were they on the paved trail? Am I seeing what I think I’m seeing? Not sure what to do, I kept running, knowing that the kind man with the dog would be encountering this same sight in just a few minutes. For the rest of the run, I wondered if I did the right thing. I asked RJP and she thought it was good I didn’t stop, especially since someone else (a man with a dog) was close behind me and could stop.
As I write this entry (at 10:45 in the morning), some (but not all) meteorologists are forecasting possible severe thunderstorms (a tornado) for late afternoon. Will they cancel open swim? Will a tornado touch down?
hours later: No! Open swim was not cancelled, although it looked ominous (or om, as I like to say) when we got there. I managed to swim 25 minutes before it thundered. Excellent!
swim: 1.5 big loops cedar lake open swim dark skies, threat of a storm
One half of the sky was a deep blue/purple, the other started mostly clear and light blue but quickly was covered in clouds as I started my swim. The water was choppy and dark and cold — why so cold? It’s almost 90 degrees! A good swim. As usual, I felt strong and fast and happy plowing through the waves. Because it’s cedar, people were swimming in whatever direction they wanted — no worries, I’ve embraced the cedar chill. Decided to do 3 quick loops then check on the weather. As I neared the shore, I noticed all the lifeguards and kayaks out of the water. At first I didn’t know why, then I heard one of them say, we need to stay out of the water for 30 minutes. Oh — it must have thundered. And, as if on cue, it thundered again. Very happy to have been able to swim at all tonight!
Another cooler morning. Sun, low wind, good air. I’ve cut back on running this month because my left hip is tight and my left kneecap has been shifting in the groove a little too much. Plus, I’m swimming more. Oh, and I had to take several days off because of COVID. And then, of course, we (much more Scott than me) moved Scott’s dad out of his apartment and into assisted living. A strange month.
Listened to the cars, blue jays, a few rowers, and an adult instructing some kids on bikes — you’re biking uphill now, so you should shift gears for most of the run. For the last mile, I put in my headphones and listened to Camelot.
10 Things I Ran On/Over/Around
soft, dry dirt
grass
concrete
dead leaves, still intact
dead leaves, half mulched
dead leaves, mostly mucky dirt
asphalt, only a few cracks
asphalt, rubbled
limestone steps
tree roots
10 Living Things Encountered
a runner with her dog on the winchell trail
a walker from behind — excuse me excuse me right behind you!
the voice of a rower drifting up from the river
the voice of 2 women walkers drifting down from the road
the fee bee of a black capped chickadee
a group of bikers — an adult + several kids
an older male runner
a young female runner
someone emerging from the porta potty, rubbing in hand sanitizer as they crossed the trail
a screeching, moaning, whining voice coming from an alley — a raccoon? a dog? nope, a kid in a stroller
swim: 3 loops (6 small loops) cedar lake open swim 79 degrees
A great swim! Not too windy or wavy or crowded. I barely saw the buoys but it doesn’t matter at cedar. People swim everywhere here. I thought I saw my shadow below me in the water. Is that possible? No fish, but a few birds. Every so often the sun reflected off the water and everything glowed. Today’s reason it’s wonderful to swim in the lake: I don’t need to SEE (as in, fine detail, fast focus, clear images) to navigate. And, my way of seeing — forms, relying on big landmarks, not panicking when things don’t quite make sense — helps me to see as good, or probably better, than most normally sighted people.
Ran with Scott up the marshall hill to cleveland, then over to St. Thomas and back down to Cretin. We were planning to get some coffee at Black, but it looked very crowded. Instead we walked down the hill to Loons and got it there. We ran most of it, except for the stretch of hill from the bottom to cretin. We walked that section.
10 Things
bad air quality from the canadian wildfires, 1: a strange orangish pinkish light
bad air quality, 2: hazy over the river — the river was sparkling in the sun, but dulled, not sharp
bad air quality, 3: a haze over the St. Thomas campus, like a strange fog, not thick but fuzzy
interesting patterns on the water’s surface — little grids of waves from the wind
crossing over to st. paul, the river was empty of rowers
crossing back over to minneapolis, Scott mentioned there were rowers. At first, I didn’t see them, but a few minutes later, I noticed a bump in the water in my periphery. Rowers! Suddenly I saw them: 2 small shells with 2 people each off in the hazy distance — this is the strange way my vision works
no bells at St. Thomas
a woman, possibly drunk, singing dude looks like a lady and then yelling out (to us?), I paid for my kids to go to this school! I wanted to speculate on what she meant, Scott did not
an irritating crosswalk that kept barking (in a low voice) wait wait wait but then, when the light changed, didn’t reciprocate go go go, but emitted a rapid series of sounds, making me imagine a round of bullets being fired but not think, Oh, I can walk now
a grand house on cleveland being gutted but not torn down and replaced with an ugly, over-sized new house (nice!, we both agreed)
a life update for future Sara to remember
On Thursday and Friday, Scott and I were in Rochester cleaning out and giving away the last bit of stuff from his parent’s apartment: lamps, chairs, a desk, cleaning supplies, a couch. The end of an era, his mom dead, his dad now in assisted living in the twin cities. Strange to say good-bye to all of this and to be reminded of how little much of your stuff matters to others once you die.
4.6 miles bottom of franklin hill and back 63 degrees
What a beautiful morning! The first 3 miles of run felt good. When I stopped to walk up the last quarter of the franklin hill then started running again, my left knee and hip felt tight. I wonder if I need to cut back a lot on my running and focus on swimming and biking for the rest of July?
10 Things
roller skiers! 15-20 of them all in a row — the clack of the skis, the click of the poles
rowers! didn’t see them, but heard the bullhorn and the coxswain instructing the rowers
a glimpse of shimmering water through the trees
someone sleeping under the franklin bridge
the sh sh sh of soft, sandy grit under my feet near the trestle
several bikes flying past me on the way down the franklin hill
greeting one runner as I passed him from behind — good morning!
bright yellow and green shirts on runners I encountered
a woman walker in a bright pink sweatshirt
passing a woman running who was listening to some guy talking — was it Ant? Stage 10 of the tour de france?
That was difficult to come up with 10 things. Was it because the run was difficult? I’m distracted?
Listened to the traffic and my breathing as I ran north, Camelot as I ran south.
bike: 8 miles lake nokomis 74 degrees
Biked with Scott to the lake. Nice! We took the trail on the way there, the streets on the way back. The streets were less fun — too many bumps and holes that I couldn’t see. Just a reminder that I bike so well on the trail because I’ve memorized the path, every curve, crack, bump.
swim: 3 loops lake nokomis open swim 75 degrees
The first loop was smooth, fast, no swells. Excellent. But by the time I started the second loop it started to become choppy. No worries. I happened to notice that they had placed the first green buoy out farther than they usually do. Nice — since I saw it, I didn’t get off course at all. I might have seen a few silver streaks below me in the water — fish?! Saw some swans, lots of yellow buoys tethered to swimmers, a couple planes. No ducks or seagulls or geese.
favorite stretch: after rounding the last green buoy, swimming parallel to the beach, heading towards the first orange buoy and the start of another loop. Such a cool sight, seeing the orange buoy far off.
Glad I only did 3 loops. As I exited the water, I realized it was raining — sprinkling. It’s funny how hard it is to tell that it’s raining when you’re swimming.
Anything else? Only remember feeling/seeing vegetation once: at the start of the swim, heading towards the orange buoy for the first time, I crossed over some milfoil growing up from the bottom.
Another beautiful summer morning: cool, quiet, not too humid or crowded. My quads and knees are still a little sore, and I was a bit stuffed up, but mostly I felt fine. Ran up the marshall hill, only stopping briefly for a red light near the bottom. Had a green light that was about to turn at the top so I sprinted across the street, then kept going.
Saw the river today as I ran over the lake street bridge. All I remember is seeing some rowers — 2 small shells. What color was the water? Was it flat? smooth? sparkling? I have no idea.
Anything else I remember? Noisy birds, bikers, pairs of runners, voices drifting across Summit avenue from some building at St. Thomas.
Carl Phillips
This morning while drinking my coffee, I came across a link to a PBS interview with one of my favorite poets, Carl Phillips. Maybe I should study Phillips for the rest of the month? I’d like to revisit his collection of essays about writing (My Trade is Mystery), and spend time with some more of his poems, like this one:
I need you the way astonishment, which is really just
the disruption of routine, requires routine. Isn’t there
a shock, though— a thrill— to having done
what we had to? Unequally, but in earnest, we love
as we can, he used to mumble, not so much his
mouth moving, more the words themselves sort of
staggering around lost inside it . . . Now show me
exactly what you think being brave is.
What is it to be brave? Often, I bristle at anyone describing my ways of adapting to losing my vision as being brave. Resourceful, resilient, creative sure, but brave?
What is it to be brave? For the past few months, Scott and I have been watching Escape to the Chateau. One of the main “characters”/actual people, Angel/Angela, calls the gloves she wears whenever she cleans or sorts through very old things, her “brave gloves.” While sorting through stuff in the 150 year old attic — I’m glad I’m wearing my brave gloves today!
What is it to be brave? Why does Alexi Pappas title her memoir about running and training and depression, Bravey? What is a bravey?
What is it to be brave, and how is that connected to courage — and what type of courage? I’d like to reread a paper I wrote way back in 2001 or 2002 about redefining courage.
COVID DAY TEN
Almost done with masking in the house! I’m feeling mostly normal; just a little too much crap in my trap (snot). Scott has lost a lot of his sense of smell and taste, but I haven’t/didn’t.
A cool morning. Great for running! Ran a little longer than yesterday. Started on Edmund but crossed over to the river road trail at 42nd. Felt good on the way there, a little tired on the way back.
Encountered walkers with dogs, a roller skier, some bikers, a noisy truck, a few other runners. Thought I heard a little voice at the falls say, she can’t hear me! Imagined she was talking about me. Wondered what she might have said, then imagined responding playfully, yes I can! A few minutes later, walking up the hill, I watched that little girl and at least one adult almost get stuck, trying to pedal a heavy surrey up the steepest part. I considered stopping to give them a push, but I thought it would be better to keep my distance. Gave a woman directions to the pool at Wabun. Avoided tree roots, wiped the sweat from my face, wasn’t able to see the river — too far away.
Listened to cars passing by and the strange rumble, buzz, whirr of a giant machine running south. Listened to “Camelot” heading north again.
COVID DAY EIGHT
Feeling mostly okay, just a lingering cold — not stuffed up, but needing to blow my nose a lot. Ready to be done wearing a mask in the house. Just a few more days! Could I possibly still be contagious?
Today is Scott and my 27th wedding anniversary. Because we’re still both sick, I don’t think we’ll be doing anything fun. Bummer. Oh well, at least we can quarantine together.
A beautiful morning! Birds, sun, breeze! Ran twice as much today as I did yesterday. By the end, my legs felt like rubber, but my breathing was okay and I didn’t feel light-headed. I’m continuing to avoid people by running in the dirt trail between edmund and the river road.
10 Things Heard
cardinals
black-capped chickadees
crows
blue-jays
robins
kids playing at minnehaha academy — laughing, yelling, clapping
blasting from a radio: “HandClap” from Fitz and the Tantrums
the wind in the trees making the leaves shimmer
construction sounds: rumbling, scraping, buzzing, roaring
[put in “Camelot” for the last mile]: “I Wonder What the King is Doing Tonight,” “The Simple Joys of Maidenhood,” and “Camelot”
COVID, DAY 7
Physically, I’m almost feeling normal. Mentally, I’m tired of this strange isolation and nowhere-to-go-ness.
Duh: So, even though he tested at least 4 times and got a negative result each time, Scott has COVID. Last night’s 5th test was positive. We both should have realized that, with his symptoms and contact with me, he had to have it, but my very first test was instantly positive so we assumed that if he had it, his would be too. He wasn’t quarantining, so we’re hoping the kids won’t be getting it next.
In related drama: FWA has his driver’s license behind-the-wheel test in Austin today. For a few dark moments last night, we thought he might have to cancel it, which could mean waiting months for another testing time. update: He passed!
current mood: worried (about an ailing parent and unmotivated (or differently? motivated) kids, being an irritating Mom) + impatient (can this quarantine be over, please, I want to go back to open swim)
Found this poem this morning. Reading this first verse, I already liked it, but when I read the “about this poem” section, I fell in love with it.
Every wood I’ve stepped into has a watchful crone, a witch whose skin resembles the bark of an ancient oak.
She spins her wool by moonlight, she threads her fingers through the moss, and knows exactly which mushrooms to pick.
I don’t need my hearing to feel the changes in the wind when she slips out of the gaps between the rocks and the trees, her voice
I feel in the roots I step on, in the stones I try to avoid with my bare feet that always manage to bruise me, test the calluses I’ve grown
with each stride I’ve taken through these trees. I’ve sung to her beneath the arms of the beeches reaching towards the birches, though she never
listens to me. I imagine she laughs at the tune I cannot keep, before moving on, gathering weeds by the stars, mixing potions to use on people
like me, who would walk into her arms gladly, wishing she were an old aunt I could visit to learn everything about this world she keeps to herself.
About this Poem
“As I slowly lost my hearing from the age of six until twenty-one, I spent more and more time in the woods and wild places where my deafness has never mattered. This poem is a homage to those places that I am still enthralled with and the never-ending magic of the forest I wish I could learn and share with other humans.” —Kris Ringman
Yes! I go to the gorge/the river/the lake because my vision loss doesn’t matter there. I’m not constantly reminded of its loss or my limitations. On the trails I know so well, I can see or, when I can’t, I don’t need to.
Since I’ve been feeling better and restless, I decided to try a little running this morning. The goal was a mile, but I ended up doing a little extra. I was worried that I might have trouble breathing, but I didn’t. It wasn’t easy, but it wasn’t too hard either.
10 Things (5 present, 5 absent)
At the end of my block, a bird shrieking non-stop, like an alarm. It kept circling above me and shrieking, almost like it was calling out, away! away! away! For a few seconds I wondered if it was going to swoop down and attack me
plastic pipes lining the sidewalk — part of the sewer project they’re doing all summer. Each pipe connected to the next with black cable-ties
the hollow sound of my foot stepping on the wooden platforms placed over the pipes
my favorite halloween house, still for sale
one runner slowly approaching to my left, breathing heavily. He was very slow. I crossed over to the other side of the road, hoping that would make it less irritating (nope). I slowed way down, almost walking, so he could finally pass
no bikers
no rowers
no roller skiers
no river (too far to see it + forgot to even glance across the road in its direction)
entire stretches of the route lost, forgotten — no memory of running past cooper field or the half-finished house that was abandoned for years then finished and now for sale for $800,000
COVID update
Feeling much better. A little stuffed up, but otherwise fine. It’s strange to feel almost normal but still have to mask and quarantine. Tedious. Disruptive. I wonder when I’ll stop testing positive?
2 things to remember
1
Found this list of 5 nature memoirs to check: The Best Nature Memoirs. When I’m done with Sharpe’s Ordinary Notes, I’d like to return to one book on the list — Savoy’s Traces, which I’ve tried to read a few times already. It’s on the Libby app.
2
A note from Christina Sharpe’s amazing book, Ordinary Notes, about the need for white people to shift from guilt to grief, complicity to relation, detachment to entanglement:
49 today. A very nice birthday run to minnehaha falls then to the new coffee place called the falls with Scott. Walked back through the neighborhood with an iced vanilla latte. Fun to see all the new apartments being built on Minnehaha and to walk down some streets that I’ve never walked down before. The air quality is still not very good (140) with smoke in the air, but it wasn’t hard for me to breathe.
Hours later…My throat started to hurt like I was sick and I was feeling run down. I think it might be the smoke/air quality.
days later…No bad air. Somehow, even though I was barely inside anywhere or close to other people for the last five days, I got COVID.
swim: 3 loops lake nokomis open swim 88 degrees
A beautiful night. The air quality is much better, the water is less choppy. What I remember most about this swim was: wearing a new suit that I just got and saying to Scott and the kids, want to see my birthday suit?, like I did when I was a little kid; barely ever being able to see any of the buoys and still staying (mostly) on course except for the first loop when I realized how far to the left the first green buoy was; feeling sore but still happy to be out in the water with the fish and the swan boats, the other swimmers and the planes up in the sky; and noticing a flash of the orange and yellow sail that is often out on the lake in the evenings.
Kept up the “one more loop” habit. Stopped for a break after 2, then did one more loop.
wordle challenge
5 tries:
feast where money lined DINER
I struggled to find inspiration with these words.
Today we feast with Diane Wiest. Where‘d you go Bernadette? (a favorite book) Money makes the world go around. (a song lyric that often gets stuck in my head) You’re telling me the kids are lined up for a slaughterhouse? (a line from my favorite horror movie) Tom’s diner — (one of my favorite songs to sing in order to irritate others)
I am sitting In the morning At the diner On the corner
I am waiting At the counter For the man To pour the coffee
3.7 miles marshall loop 70 degrees / dew point: 61
It started raining off and on around 8:30. I don’t mind swimming in the rain, but I wasn’t sure the lifeguards would go out on the lake in this weather. So no open swim. Instead I ran in the early afternoon. Sticky, but not too hot. No sun. Not too many people. Saw some rowers on the river. The surface of the water was a strange texture, roughened by the wind.
memorable moment
Nearing the 3 way intersection at the river road and 36th: a swarm of vespas — 15? One after the other. Not all of them were bright yellow, but at least one was. Wow.
wordle challenge
5 tries: bench / prose / lower / gored / rodeo
In her dream there’s always a bench. Often the benches I run by have small plaques on them, dedicated to some lost loved one. I hope my family does this for me.
They shut me up in Prose/ Emily Dickinson
They shut me up in Prose – As when a little Girl They put me in the Closet – Because they liked me “still” –
Still! Could themself have peeped – And seen my Brain – go round – They might as wise have lodged a Bird For Treason – in the Pound –
Himself has but to will And easy as a Star Look down opon Captivity – And laugh – No more have I –
lowercase
maggie and millie and molly and may / e.e. cummings
maggie and milly and molly and may went down to the beach(to play one day)
and maggie discovered a shell that sang so sweetly she couldn’t remember her troubles,and
milly befriended a stranded star whose rays five languid fingers were;
and molly was chased by a horrible thing which raced sideways while blowing bubbles:and
may came home with a smooth round stone as small as a world and as large as alone.
For whatever we lose(like a you or a me) it’s always ourselves we find in the sea
A few days ago, I read the book in The Odyssey titled, “Bloodshed.” Very gory. So many spears and arrows and swords and bloody, gored bodies.
I had probably heard the phrase before, but my first memory of this isn’t your first rodeo is from my physical therapist describing how my kneecap has probably slid out of its groove many times before without me fully realizing it.
Ran earlier today, at 7:15. A little cooler, quieter. For the first few minutes, I recited Alice Oswald’s “A Short Story of Falling” which I memorized yesterday. Ran south on the grassy boulevard between edmund and the river road. Crossed over at Becketwood, then ran down to the southern entrance of the Winchell Trail.
Listened to the gentle whooshing of car wheels. the clicking and clacking of ski poles, and birds for most of the run. Put in a Bruno Mars playlist for the last mile.
After I finished my run, I recited Alice Oswald’s “A Short Story of Falling” into my phone. Only messed up one line (I think).
10 Things
click clack click clack
the rambling root spread across the dirt trail
the steady dripping — more than a trickle, less than a rush — of the water falling from the sewer pipe
the soft (not mushy) blanket of dead leaves on the winchell trail
the sharp sparkle of the light on the water
shhhhhh — the wind passing through the leaves on the trees
the soft roar of the city underneath everything
the leaning branches have been removed — thanks Minneapolis Parks People!
an almost exchange of the You and I — me: right behind you, excuse me an older woman with a dog: mmhmm
no bugs, no gnats, no geese
wordle challenge
3 tries: front / brine / crane
front runt stunt blunt hunt shunt grunt redundant brine sign fine line shine dine design unwind spine twine crane explain refrain detain rain insane
front
frontispiece:
1
a: the principal front of a building b: a decorated pediment over a portico or window
2
: an illustration preceding and usually facing the title page of a book or magazine
Its back and forth, ad nauseum, ought to make the sea a bore. But walks along the shore cure me. Salt wind’s the best solution for dissolving my ennui in, along with these protean sadnesses that sometimes swim invisibly as comb-jelly a glass or two of wine below my surface. Some regrets won’t untangle. Others loosen as I watch the waves spreading their torn nets of foam along the sand to dry. I walk and walk and walk and walk, letting their haul absorb me. One seal’s hull scuttled to bone staves gulls scream wheeling above. And here… small, diabolical, a skate’s egg case, its horned purse nested on pods of bladderwort that still squirt BRINE by the eyeful. Some oily slabs of whale skin, or —no, just an edge of tire flensed from a commoner leviathan. Everywhere, plastic nurdles gleam like pearls or caviar for the avian gourmand and bits of sponge dab the wounded wrack-line, dried to froths of air smelling of iodine. Hours blow off down the beach like spindrift, leaving me with an immense less-solipsistic sense of ruin, and, as if it’s a gift, assurance of ruin’s recurrence.
crane
“The Crane Wife” parts 1, 2, and 3 from the Decemberists
swim: 1 small loop (1/2 big loop) cedar lake open swim 88 degrees
First open swim with FWA at cedar lake! A great night for it: calm, clear, not too crowded. The buoys were up tonight. Hooray!
Warm again this morning. I need to start my run sooner. I heard the coxswain below instructing the rowers, but I forget to look for them as I ran down the franklin hill. I don’t remember looking at the river at all. Did I? I was too distracted by people — bikers, runners, walkers.
Best part of the run: heading down the hill, feeling good, someone else running up the hill called out, looking strong! I called back, you too! Her words made me feel good and even stronger. Such a kind gesture. I started thinking again about these small exchanges and how they give us the chance to be both an I (who recognizes) and a you (who is recognized).
Listened to rowers, birds, and cheering runners as I ran north. Listened to Hamilton on my headphones on the way back south. it’s a blur sir
wordle challenge
6 tries (with a hint from FWA): chirp / doubt / smoke / flank / wagon / KAZOO
In the morning
when the birds chirp doubt goes up in smoke delight outflanks grief and regret hitches a wagon ride out of town. Only the faint buzz of his kazoo lingers then joins in the cardinal chorus.
swim: 2.5 big loops (5 little loops) cedar lake open swim 88 degrees
The first open swim at cedar! Wonderful. The water wasn’t too choppy or cold. Everyone was (mostly) swimming the right way. No leg cramps or worry about swimming off course.
10 Things
the beach was packed with people
the water, which is usually clear here, was opaque
a few silver flashes below me — fish?
stopping near the beach for a minute, I looked down in the water and saw shafts of light
itchy vines, floating into me
I swam over one vine floating horizontally and it felt like I was getting a full body scan
many of the vines were attached — at both beaches I swam through a thick forest of underwater vegetation
no buoys, only lifeguards on kayaks set up in the middle of the lake, which was no problem for sighting (at least for me)
2 different paddleboarders crossed right in front of me
birds flying over the lake above me — I couldn’t tell how big they were
Nice to be home and able to run this loop after a few days away, moving a parent out of an apartment in one city and into another in another city. Wasn’t sure how it would feel to run up the marshall hill, but it wasn’t too bad. I remember noticing things as I ran, but now I can’t remember what I noticed, except —
screeching bluejays, leaves on trees shivering in the wind, voices floating up from the gorge, sparkling river water, a sandbar emerging from just below the lake street bridge. Bikers, walkers, runners
almost getting hit by a bike (my fault) — not sure how close it was; my body didn’t tense up in panic, so I’m guessing it wasn’t that close. It happened because my eyes/brain can only see one thing at a time and I was distracted by some stopped bikers who looked like they were going to cross, but weren’t. Why weren’t they crossing, I wondered, thinking maybe there was a car that I couldn’t see (it’s happened before).
a shell with 2 rowers on the river, the bells at St. Thomas chiming nine times, sprinklers, tree roots, hard-packed dirt, almost losing my balance on the edge of the east river trail but managing to stay on the path, looking strange to anyone who might have seen me, I’m sure
Listened to birds, voices, my breath for most of the ran. Put in a Bruno Mars playlist for the last mile.
wordle challenge
4 tries: tough / beach / march / ranch
tough: and the grass was as tough as hemp and no color no more than sand was a color(I Remember/ Anne Sexton)
Did a quick run in Austin with Scott that ended at The Coffee Place in downtown Austin, across from the SPAM museum. Ran past: the cemetery with Scott’s mom’s grave, the mill pond (I think it’s called the mill pond), the Plantar’s Peanut Mobile parked by a chain-link fence, I-90, and a lot of other things I can’t remember. It was smoky from wildfires in the Boundary Waters and cooler than I expected.
The things I remember most about this morning were not the run, but: the reconstituted eggs (yuck!) at the hotel breakfast buffet, watching bits of a few episodes of Living Single, and the phone call from the doctor telling Scott that his dad was being released from the hospital much earlier than expected. Instant decision: instead of going home, which was our plan, we drove over to Rochester and loaded up a car with a mattress and bed frame, then drove to Scott’s dad’s new assisted living apartment in the twin cities to drop it off. Then drove back to Rochester (60 miles) and loaded the car up again. Mayo Hospital had led us to believe he wouldn’t be released until the following week. I am not a fan of Mayo (and never have been) — they may be good at curing unusual diseases but they suck at caring for actual people. Boo to arrogant doctors. Boo to prioritizing fancy buildings over the needs of community members. Boo to insurance companies that pressure hospitals into releasing patients too soon.
Wordle Challenge
note: I didn’t have time to do the wordle challenge this morning, so these words are from the next day when I didn’t run.
4 tries: flash / waxes / apron / STRAP
a flash of white the moon grows and shrinks waxes and wanes all in an instant as an apron of clouds travels across the sky sometimes the clouds appear as soft cover and sometimes they seem to conceal and subdue, each thick layer of vapor a strap securing the moon to the sky
note: I’d like to replace one of the skies with something else — I’ll think about it some more
revision, 18 june 2023
A flash of white grows and shrinks waxes and wanes all in an instant as an apron of dark clouds travels across.
Sometimes the clouds offer soft cover and sometimes they conceal and subdue each thick layer of vapor a strap securing the moon to the sky
Ran on the dirt trail between edmund and the river road heading south, then down to the winchell trail for the way back. A good run where I mostly ran slow with a few stretches of fast.
Listened to the water dripping, the cars gently whooshing, giant mowing machines whirring on the way south and for most of the winchell trail north. Put in Lizzo for the last mile.
9 Things I Noticed
the water was blue when I had a clear view and a blinding, shining white through the gaps in the trees
another friendly exchange and shift from I to You when I thanked a pedestrian for moving over for me: Thank you! You’re welcome!
couldn’t hear the water dripping below 42nd because of the dizz dizz dizz of a giant machine up above
the same almost fallen branches, leaning over the winchell trail
rowers! never saw them, but heard the coxswain prepping them on what to do in a race
lots of cars steadily and gently moving north on the river road
birds birds birds — didn’t see them, only heard them
wet dirt on the trail — was it dew or did it rain last night?
lots of bikers and walkers — less runners, no roller skiers
Cool-ish this morning. Sunny, a little wind. Good running weather. If I had gone out when Scott did, at 7, it would have been great running weather. It was in the 50s then.
As I ran north towards the franklin bridge, I suddenly wondered, have I run the franklin loop since the snow melted, when I could run on the walking path? I didn’t think so. [I was right; I looked it up and my last franklin loop run was april 6th.]
Running over franklin bridge, the river was blue with flecks of silver that I could barely see from behind the railing. Not a single rowing shell. No big paddleboats either.
Running over the lake street bridge, I didn’t really look at the river. Instead I watched a worker in his orange and yellow vest standing by the railing. What was he doing? It took me a little time to put the scene together: the worker was standing at the railing on one side of the sidewalk. On the other side of the wall, parked on the road part of the bridge was a truck with an arm that reached above our heads and over the edge of the bridge. I assume someone was in the bucket below. My first thought: are they inspecting the bridge and is it about to collapse? As I got closer to the worker, the truck, and the arm, I saw another guy standing near the truck. He seemed to be letting the first guy know when it was clear (meaning, after I had passed by). Why write this tedious description? Partly to demonstrate how my vision works. I imagine a normally sighted person could take this entire scene in with one or two glances. I have to stare for 20 or 30 seconds at least, slowly putting together what I see. As best as I can remember, here was my thought process:
hmm….that guy up ahead has a bright orange and yellow safety vest on.
Does he work for the city, or is he some random walker being extra careful?
Is he taking a break, admiring the view, or doing something else?
He’s not peeing off the side, is he? No, of course not.
Oh, there’s an arm from a truck reaching over — they’re working on the bridge!
Can I run by, or do I need to turn around?
I’m sure many people have some of these thoughts, but if you can see “normally” they probably come all at once and are answered almost instantly. My thoughts come slowly and sometimes get stuck.
wordle challenge
3 tries: first/ drown/ wrong
the first time she almost drowned, she knew something was wrong. First, drown the mushrooms in white wine. There’s no wrong way to do it.
When you first jump into very cold water it might feel like you’re drowning. A shock, a heaviness, panic. Something seems wrong. It is.
at first, a burst in a gown, you might drown any song with a gong will be wrong
There was an old lady on first whose cheesecake was always the worst she’d bake it so long that the texture was wrong and all of the berries would burst
first burst worst rehearse reverse cursed drown down frown renown found clown town crown wrong song long bong gong along oblong elongate
There was an old lady on first who always believed she was cursed convinced she would drown at the hands of a clown she wandered the streets in a hearse
The lady on first was so cruel she drowned all her cats in the pool her heart, it was wrong it sang a bad song and tasted like boarding school gruel
Like yesterday, I could spend a lot more time with these words, trying to come up with something, but I’ll stop for now.
Another run with sore legs. I ran all the way up the marshall hill without stopping to walk. Didn’t stop to walk until I got back to the bridge. Then I put in a playlist.
10 Things I Noticed
2 tiny dogs in a fenced-in yard a few blocks from my house barking tiny, yippy, delightful barks
waveless water — no ripples or sparkles, flat and blue
heading east: no rowers
returning west: at least one rowing shell, far off to the south
equal numbers of runners, bikers, and walkers (last week it was mostly bikers)
the soft trickling of water at shadow falls
voices below in the gorge, voices behind slowly approaching
rounding a corner near minnehaha academy: a refreshing sprinkler/mister!
at the top of the hill, near summit, a graduation party already in full swing at 8:45 am
lots of birds making noise — can’t remember any one bird, just birds
No roller skiers or radios. No brightly colored running shirts (but several runners without a shirt). No honking geese or drumming woodpeckers or floating cottonwood fuzz or gnats.
Yesterday I forgot to mention that I saw someone on a unicycle! At first I thought the biker was just really tall. Nope, he was on a unicycle. Nice.
wordle challenge
5 tries — mouth/ready/blank/gnaws/again
empty, again
your mouth may be ready but your mind is blank. A hunger for words gnaws at your throat.
A good run, but a hard run. Stopped at the overlook near ford bridge, almost 4 miles in to admire the river — blue and still. No rowers or waves or river boats. After my stop, I ran for a few minutes, walked for a few the rest of the way. By the end, my legs were sore — not like I had an injury, but like I should have drank more water or eaten more food before I left.
overheard
was this really what I heard/saw?
a walker talking to another walker: it was because she was so flat! as she said the word flat she gestured with her hands like she was demonstrating a flat chest.
wordle challenge
june 7: 4 tries —
bread orbit grubs crumb
The bread will be on the table The moon will orbit the earth The grubs will become beetles The crumb will be carried away by the ant.
If bread is to butter as orbit is to center and grubs are to beetles to whom does the crumb belong?
Each face in the street is a slice of bread (W.S. Merwin) a previously undiscovered moon orbiting a planet (dear, beloved/ sumita chakraborty) grubs without a voice (millennium, six songs/ marilyn chin) the crumbs of shadow (Sylvia Plath), the crumbling of elemental rust (Emily Dickinson
june 8: 5 tries
reach waist pansy salsa balsa
To reach my waist the pansy will need to grow taller than this salsa bowl made from balsa wood
as I reach the edge of the garden my waist brushes against the tall grass as a yellow pansy stares with its sad purple eyes. Through the kitchen window, I see my sister cutting jalapenos for a salsa my mom improvising popsicle sticks from leftover balsa wood
3.1 miles trestle turn around 72 degrees dew point: 61
Ran with Scott this morning. Another warm, thick, still morning. We followed Scott’s getting-back-into-running training plan: run 15 minutes, walk 2, run 15 minutes. Our walk started right by the trestle. My left hip felt a little stiff, my left knee harder to lift at the beginning, but I mostly felt fine. My big right toe isn’t hurting anymore.
10 Things I Noticed
birds, 1: several little birds on the path, reluctant to fly away, forcing a biker to slow down
birds, 2: more of these little birds — sparrows? finches? — stopped right in front of me a few minutes later
the white bike — a memorial for some biker killed by a car years ago — hanging upsdie down under the trestle
green green green
cottonwood fuzz lining the sides of the path, a pale green, looking like corroded copper to me
a few puddles of water near the sidewalk edges — did it rain last night, or had nearby grass been watered?
hi dave! hi sara! hi scott! I was impressed that Dave the Daily Walker remembered Scott’s name, so was he
only 1 or 2 small rocks stacked on the ancient boulder
the cracks in the paved trail that they just redid 2 years ago are spreading and deepening, splitting the trail in two. I made note of a small hole that I’ll need to remember to avoid next time I run this way
a woman in a BRIGHT pink shirt and BRIGHT green pants — wow! I wonder if this is the same woman in the BRIGHT pink pants the other day?
No bugs, no roller skiers, no view of the river. No music, no packs of runners, no irritating encounters. No rowers, no overheard conversations, no drumming woodpeckers.
today’s wordle challenge
3 tries / wrong place SCOUT
Here a few “poems” with these words:
They call her wrong place scout because she always seems to find the place no one was looking for (or wanted).
wrong place scout
I was in the wrong place but it must have been the right time I had found the wrong camp but stumbled on the right line I was near the wrong guy but he must have said the right words He led me through the wrong door but out into the right world.
There is no wrong place to be when you are scouting mystery.
I forgot about the dark bird I saw rooting in the hydrangeas looking like it landed in the wrong place until today when I learned about the purple martin scout and decided that that was what it was.
Even though the finished products of this wordle challenge aren’t the greatest, the experiment was fun to do. I thought about different meanings of scout and listened to/studied the lyrics of Dr. John’s “Right Place, Wrong Time.” I also learned about purple martins and remembered a strange bird I watched in my back yard the other day. Bonus: I became aware of the existence of “Minnesota’s Largest Purple Martin House” in Audubon, Minnesota. Wow.
Here’s a water poem that is by one of my favorite poets and will be etched on NASA’s Europa clipper as it travels to study one of Jupiter’s moons:
Hot, thick, very poor air quality. There’s a warning about the bad air until midnight: “fine particle pollution” from wild fires in Quebec. I don’t think it really bothered me as I ran.
I ran south on the dirt trail in the grass between edmund and the river road, crossed over to the trail, then headed down to the southern entrance of the Winchell Trail. Ran north until 38th, took the steps up, returned to trail past the ravine, through the tunnel of trees, then crossed over the edmund at 33rd.
Listened to cars whooshing by, kids heading to school, water sprinkling out of the sewer pipe for the first 2 miles. Listened to a Bruno Mars playlist for the last mile.
Before the run, I was thinking about water and The Odyssey — I was reading it all weekend — and how much Odysseus and his men ache for home. And I was imagining how restless they’ll be if and when they get home and stay for too long. Restlessness and staying reminded me of a few things:
Mary Oliver’s restless water and her satisfied stones in The Leaf and the Cloud:
It is the nature of stone to be satisfied. It is the nature of water to want to be somewhere else.
Ennui The latest trend among those trapped in a post-pandemic plane is to neigh with horsey impatience softly scream into a skein of restlessness
The Horse Girls trending: on the plane between child and young adult wild neigh and reserved whinny they skein obsessions out of their edgy ennui OR out of their ennui
So, I started the run with all of these thoughts still lingering. Within a mile, I started thinking more about restlessness and water. At the end of the run, I pulled out my smart phone and recorded some of those thoughts:
june 5, 2023
transcript: June 5. Just finished my 2 trails run, a 5K. Today I was thinking about restlessness and water and the idea that usually water is restless, constantly moving. But today, in this thick humid morning with haze and poor air quality, it is everything else that is restless, and the water that refuses to move. The river stills. The sweat hovers on my chin, refusing to fall, to bring relief. We are restless: the cars, impatient, as they move past me on the road. Even my legs, as I try to run down hills, refuse to move with any speed. Contrast between the restless and the still.
I remember looking at the river and seeing haze. The only water that was moving at all was the water steadily dripping out of the sewer pipe.
Another thing I just remembered from before my run: I briefly thought about a vision poem I encountered last week and have wanted to post here. Today’s the day!
Because my husband is going slowly blind, the lights in our house have motion sensors. As I walk through the rooms I am the star of the show, lit one-by-one by spotlights as I go. Desiring the dark, I must sit motionless. One itch, one twitch, and up come the houselights, rendering me suddenly—again—audience of me.
Tonight we are sitting in the dark beside the Christmas tree. Its strands of blinking lights remind my husband of his childhood, when he could see. I find it funny they don’t remind him of the blinking lights that ring the edges of his eye field, proof of his rods and cones one-by-one dying. Not ha-ha funny, the other kind.
There are things ha-ha funny about going blind though. Like that time he walked wearing a three-piece wool suit into the deep end of a swimming pool in a hotel in Italy. I wasn’t there—he told me later. I was at home, turning lights on and off through only my anxious pacing.
Sitting by the Christmas tree, I squeeze my husband’s hand—squeeze and release, squeeze and release—my hand blinking in his. It’s such a tiny motion the sensors don’t detect it. Someday my husband will sit in the dark and wave his arms wildly and still be in the dark. One-by-one every- thing happens, every disappearance appears.
Ran with Scott. Another hot, sunny morning. After a few minutes of warming up, I recited the latest poem I memorized for my list of 100 poems: Tony Hoagland’s “Summer Studies.” Later, near the end of the run, I recited 2 Emily Dickinson poems, “I felt a cleaving in my Mind” and “Hope is a thing with feathers.” Reciting the poems, then talking about them a little, helped distract us from our sweaty effort.
The big event of the run that Scott wanted to make sure I mentioned was the set-to between a small pileated woodpecker and a squirrel. We heard the squeak of a bird, then some rustling of leaves, then I saw a furry darting streak in the tree. Who won, I wonder? And why were they fighting?
Other bird events: A female cardinal flew out in front of Scott just as he was running around a tree ahead of me. I saw him flinch, but not the whirr of the brown bird in flight. A band or scold or screech of blue jays shrieked out across the grass between edmund and the river road, which prompted us to have a conversation about how much better crows are then blue jays. No turkeys in turkey hollow.
We ran past the house on edmund that posts a poem in the front window. A new one about sunflowers! I can’t remember what it’s called, or who wrote it. I’ll just have to run by the house again to figure it out. I don’t have strong opinions about sunflowers. Maybe that’s because I hardly ever see them.
Looking for water poems, I found something else, beside a water poem:
After our run, walking Delia the dog, Scott and I talked about Wordle, which I just recently started playing. I told him about my morning routine: a quick look at Facebook, then re-memorize a few poems, read the poem of the day at 3 poetry sites, then wordle. He suggested I try a new experiment: write a poem every day for a month inspired by the wordle that day:
The number of lines = the number of tries I have to make Each line must include the word that I guessed possible bonus = the theme of the poem is the correct word
Today: 4 tries: farce blame beads beast
What a farce to blame the sun for the beads on your brow you, beast, were born to sweat.
I don’t really like this, but it’s a start. Maybe I’ll add one more rule: a 5 minute time limit?
Hot and sticky. Sprinklers everywhere. Ran through one just before I reached the lake street bridge. Crossing, I glanced down at the rowers on the river. Rowers! I couldn’t hear them, and I could barely see them over the bridge railing, but they were there. Was it a nice day to row, or too hot and windless? The trails were crowded with groups of runners taking over the paths.
Listened to the sprinklers, water falling over the limestone at Shadow Falls, birds for the first 2/3 of the run. Put in my headphones as I walked up the steps of the lake street bridge and listened to Billie Eilish and Dolly Parton and Elton John as I ran (with a few walk breaks) home.
Now, after the run, I’m wiped and can’t think of much to write about the run or water or anything, really.
Just one more thing. Before I ran, I read through this Carl Phillips poem — not a slow, close reading, but a quick one. As I ran, I occasionally thought about rivers and what kind of subjects/selves they are and how loving them is different than loving lakes (which is something I focused on 2 years ago).
6 miles bottom franklin hill and back 76 degrees / dew point: 64
Hot! I much prefer running in the cold to running in the heat. Still, today is my 12 year anniversary — my runniversary — and I had to get out there to celebrate it. 12 years ago today I went out for my first couch to 5K run.
Was able to say good morning to Mr. Morning! Noticed the river. Higher above, it burned white through the trees. Down below in the flats, it looked stagnant and brown and not refreshing at all. Heard some birds and a woman saying to her friend, during times of war they…, as I ran past. Smiled and waved at many walkers and runners. Thought I heard the rowers but I was wrong. Wondered if the roller skier I passed as I ran down the hill and she skated up it was using poles — I couldn’t tell because we were both moving too fast. Watched the red flash flash flash of a bike’s back light disappear into the distance. Felt the sweat dripping and trickling and seeping out of my skin.
Listened to the birds and the cars as I ran north. Recorded some thoughts into my phone as I walked up the hill. Put in a playlist — bday 2018 — as I ran back south.
Be Water My Friend
It’s the beginning of the month; time for a new challenge. For June 2023, more on water. I’d like to read Alice Oswald’s Nobody, but I need to read The Odyssey first. I started yesterday. I love Emily Wilson’s recent translation. Very fun. Anyway, I’ll finish The Odyssey, then read Oswald’s take on it in Nobody. At the same time, I’m thinking of reviewing some water poems I’ve already collected — maybe memorizing a few, then using them for inspiration. Maybe I’ll even do another cento? Today I started with Oswald’s Evaporations, partly because it came up as a poem I posted on june 2, 2021. I also watched a clip of Bruce Lee’s Be Water My Friend.
Empty your mind. Be formless shapeless like water now you put water into a cup it becomes the cup you put water into a bottle it becomes the bottle you put it into a tea pot it becomes the tea pot now water can flow or it can craaaaasshh be water my friend
before the run
As I ran I hoped to think about water subjectivities and what it is to be water . I think this was also inspired by a quote from Oswald that I re-read yesterday:
I sometimes wonder whether I’m a very keen swimmer, and whether for me, poetry is equivalent to swimming. I’ve often noticed when I swim, the strangeness of the way the body literally turns into a fish, but the head remains human and rather cold, and looking around at this strange flat reflective surface. I’m often very piercingly aware of the difference between my head and my body when I’m swimming because I’m not necessarily someone who goes underwater, I love swimming along the surface of rivers. Perhaps, my poems do feel a need to convey that continued separation of the head remaining human and the body becoming animal, or plant, or mineral, or whatever it can be. In some way, I suppose I’m trying to find rhythms that will heal that divide.
*
I think that’s exactly it, that we seem to exist as bodies and minds. That’s always slightly troubled me that I can’t quite make them be the same thing. I always have two narratives going on and it’s extraordinary the way the mind is floating around seemingly quite untethered and yet the body has all these laws like gravity, and limit, and size, and hunger, that it’s obeying. How those two interact and how they come to define what it is to be human is again—I’m wary of using the verb think because I don’t think poetry is necessarily about thinking—but it gets hold of questions, and reveals them as questions, and then reveals what’s underneath them, and then what’s underneath that. I suppose each book tries to peel away a layer of that problem and present it again.
Halfway through the run, I stopped to record my thoughts by speaking into my smart phone: Almost 3.5 miles in, just walking back up the franklin hill on a super hot, humid day. Before I started running, I was thinking about water and I read and then listened to Alice Oswald’s “Evaporations” and Bruce Lee’s “Be Water My Friend.” So I was thinking about how there’s a line in the Alice Oswald about how water prefers to be disorderly and slapdash —
I notice The Water doesn’t like it so orderly What Water admires Is the slapstick rush of things melting
I was thinking of this dog bark I heard across the road on Seabury and my thought was that this bark was slapdash. Then I was thinking of Bruce Lee’s “Be Water” and how I feel even more like water right now because I’m not just damp, I’m dripping sweat in this humidity. And I’m not sure why this happened but I started to think about — oh, I was thinking about how I had locked into this rhythm and I could really feel it in my glutes, which is great because I think that’s what you ideally want, and I was feeling that I was in a steady rhythm, not really thinking, more animal, and then I thought about how it feels more like a machine to me (than an animal). Then I was thinking about how when machines are being designed/engineered, they look to the bio-mechanics of various animals. Machines are really animals with a very strict routine. Animals and machines and Donna Haraway and cyborgs — the idea of us being both machines and animals. What part of us is the I, the animal, the machine, the — ?
[a few minutes later] I almost forgot, when I turned around at the 3 mile point and went on the lower trail right by the river, the river looked very still and un-refreshing. I looked at it, and because it was so still, the clouds were reflected in it, and I thought about Huidobro’s line, 8 glances to turn the sea into sky. I thought what I was doing was turning the river into sky….And now I’m thinking about these different subjectivities we inhabit — the I, the animal, the machine — when you recognize that you’re all of those things, that doesn’t mean you are free from subjectivity and your specific historical, material location; it just means that you’ve eliminated division, you’re immersed in the water where it’s all together. It all is entangled — a better word? [thinking of Ross Gay here]
after my run
A lot of thoughts on water and subjectivity and the I/animal/machine are reoccurring ideas that I’ve been writing about/wrestling with for years. I think it was last year that I started to imagine myself as less of a fish in the water, more of a boat. What does it look like, how might it feel to be all of these things — water, boat, fish, human/brain?
note: I added the second part of Evaporations to my list of poems to memorize.
A few days ago, I found some summer heat poems on the NYTimes Book Review. I thought I saved the link, but now I can’t find it. My favorite was this one:
Summer Studies/ Tony Hoagland
When Ellen told Mary about the secret lake she swore her to silence
but Mary invited Jerome who couldn’t even swim and Luanne
came with him and it was funny that summer the way that scarce resources
collided with the whole system of who was cool, or not
the old rule being that who was cool would get to stay that way
by jumping into the lake and who was not would have to stay
hot and dirty by simple omission of information.
But that dry summer the rumors spread: someone was giving out maps, someone
was giving tutorials in every twist and bobby-pin turn
you had to take in the red dirt road that got you there.
When you got near you could hear through the trees
splashes and cries of people who might not even be friends.
And the clear water, like the social milieu that summer was quite frankly stirred up, confused
thanks to the leaky lips, Ellen said, of certain persons
Warm this morning, but it didn’t feel miserably hot, probably because I was able to be in the shade for most of the run. So much wonderful shade, so many friendly shadows! Ran south above, north below, on the Winchell Trail. Didn’t look at the river much, even when I was closer to it. One glance: between the thickening trees near the southern entrance of the Winchell Trail, I saw a small patch of sparkling water.
today’s color: the blue of the blue jay (I think it was a blue joy) that flashed past me as I rounded the curve at 42nd. Normally I can’t see the color of birds, and I’m not sure if you’d call what I saw seeing, more like the idea of blue or a voice calling out, blue! What kind of blue was it? Not deep or dark but light and intense, almost glowing. But not pale blue — somewhere in-between dark and light.
10 Things I Noticed
the shadow of tree sprawled across the path
the steady flow of water coming out of the sewer pipe near 42
the clicking and clacking of roller skier’s poles up above me near folwell
passing 2 walkers and hearing one of them say walk or should be walking or something like that
the steady stream of cars driving by
a few kids’ voices at the playground
the flash of a white t-shirt up ahead on the trail, then disappearing around the bend
leaning trees creating archways to pass through in several spots on the winchell trail
cottonwood fuzz on the edges of the trail
the metal slats in the ravine were slick and slippery
Mary Ruefle on Eavesdropping, You, and Unhitching in “On Sentimentality”
before the run
Today’s the last day of May and my last day with Mary Ruefle. I just finished reading/skimming her lecture, “On Sentimentality.”
Eavesdropping: In response to a poet who criticizes and laments the too frequent use of a generic You in poetry as too passive, turning us into observers, mere eavesdroppers, Ruefle asks: What’s wrong with eavesdropping? I agree. Today during my run, eavesdrop. Listen in on conversations between birds, the river and the sky, walkers.
YOU: What kind of subject are you (or is You)? And, if you are You, then who is the I? The path, a shadow, that tree? Think about this as you run beside the river.
unhitching: to crudely paraphrase Lévi-Strauss, unhitching happens in brief moments when we can step outside of or beside or just beyond — below the threshold of thought, over and above society — to contemplate/experience/behold the this, the what it is, the essence of everything, Mary Oliver’s eternity. In your run above the gorge, near the river, below the trees, can you unhitch?
during the run
In spite of the warm conditions, I managed to wonder about/wander through or with all 3 of these! A little bit of eavesdropping, some unhitching or at least thinking about how/where unhitching is possible, and becoming a You.
All of these ideas were simmering in my mind the entire time I ran, but I had a breakthrough in the second mile as I passed a walker and a dog on the Winchell Trail. They noticed me before I reached them and moved to the side. I said thank you and the woman replied you’re welcome. As I continued running on the steep-ish trail with no railing I thought about how when I said thank you, I was the I, she was the you. But when she answered you’re welcome, I become the you and she the I. Each of us both. Then I started thinking about the space and time between when we each embodied the pronoun, before my I turned into a you or her you into and I. This is the space of possibility where unhitching can happen, when we can be both a you and an I or something else that doesn’t divide and separate or assign us a fixed role — as active I or passive you. A moment when we can experience or behold the is below the threshold of thought, over and above society and its constructs. Not long after thinking these things, I encountered the blue flash of the bird and it felt magical.
I wanted to hold onto these ideas so I eventually stopped in the ravine, just past the oak savanna, to record my thoughts.
we exchanged the You. First they were the you, then I was, but there was some time in-between before we switched from I to you or you to I that was undetermined or both or nothing and that it’s those moments where we have the opportunity to unhitch.
the immeasurable or barely measurable lag between what we do, what we feel, what we hear, what we see, and our brain and as it travels to the brain then travels back out in whatever form. That is where those moments occur. (I’m thinking about a Radiolab episode I listened to last year)
thoughts recording during my run
And, a few minutes later, after my run was done, I recorded a few more thoughts:
Instead of lamenting the loss of what we once were like in Marie Howe’s “Singularity,” what if we gave more attention to the possibilities that exist in those spaces between the You and the I? Those moments of unhitching …And I was thinking about Robin Wall Kimmerer and the moss again and this idea of enough-ness, being satisfied with the small moments. Not trying to get more, to be more, but to just be, or to not be, or to be passive.
Not an observer or eavesdropper as someone who is spying on, staring at, invading the space of others. Not a lurker, as in lurking troll. Is there another way to understand how to notice the world passively? An absorber? Not a lurker, but a dweller?
thoughts recorded after my run
After my run, I also recorded myself reciting a poem that memorized a few years ago and was trying to keep fresh as one of my 100 poems memorized: Natural Forces/Vincente Huidobro. I almost got every word correct.
after the run
Such a great run, with so many interesting ideas! Arriving home and then trying to put the feeling of the run and the feeling of my thoughts into words, dulled some of the shine. It’s hard to find the right best proper most profound complete words to translate the experience. I didn’t want to lose so many great ideas and the moments of clarity. Then, another thought: what if the goal was not to accurately or exhaustively remember and then record my thoughts and feelings, but to hold onto those feelings and allow them to shift my perspective. I’m not sure that makes sense, but it did to me when I first thought it.
I have enjoyed reading Ruefle all this month. I’ve gotten to know her a little bit better and been able to wander in many different directions. I’ve also experimented with a new way of engaging with ideas/authors/writings. As an academic, I used to spend hours trying to effectively (and comprehensively) summarize the argument of a piece of writing. This summary, what one of my profs called appreciation, was always the first step. With Ruefle, attempting to lay out her entire argument in a neat and logical way doesn’t work. Why try to pin down her wild and wandering thoughts in such a way? Why waste all of my energy trying to summarize something that shouldn’t be summarized? So instead, I’ve been trying to engage with the little bits and bobs (thanks British TV for reminding me of this wonderful phrase!) that resonate for me. For me the point is not to KNOW these poems and lectures and essays by Ruefle but to FEEL them in small and big ways.
Some other ideas in “On Sentimentality” that I want to store away for future Sara:
I You They are invented devices
The words I, and you, and they, are grammatical devices invented simply for arrangement and totally devoid of the intense and exclusive sense usually attributed to them.
“On Life”/ Percy Shelley, quoted in Ruefle’s MRH, page 32
on vague Yous and John Keats’ “This Living Hand”
The poem is nothing but a gigantic, disembodied hand pointing a finger at someone. That finger is a magnet and a conductor: it reaches out to the vague, ill-defined you like God reaching within an inch of Adam, and it charges the reader with all the responsibility in the world: go figure these things out for yourself, while you still have blood in your veins.
page 35
another definition of poetry
a good poem is seldom comfortable; either it vanquishes us with anguish or electrifies us with ecstasy or makes us pause and consider a new sense of the world or unravels us altogether, but never does it make us feel comfortable in the fashing of these ads [part of a discussion about an ad that used the phrase, the poetry of knits].
pages 46-47
unhitching
The possibility, vital for life, of unhitching, which consists … in grasping, during the brief intervals in which our species can bring itself to interrupt its hive-like activity, the essence of what it was and continues to be, below the threshold of thought and over and above society; in the conntemplating of a mineral more beautiful than all our creations; in the scent that can be smelt at the heart of a lily and is more imbued with learning than all our books; or in the brief glance, heavy with patience, serenity and mutual forgiveness, that, through some involuntary understanding, one can sometimes exchange with a cat.
Lévi-Strauss quoted MRH page 52
Returning again to the ideas of You and I and We and Us, I wonder if some of my thoughts were influenced by a poem I read while drinking my coffee:
5 miles franklin hill turn around 65 degrees humidity: 76%
When I woke up this morning, I could smell the rain. Waited until it stopped, around 8 am, to go out for my run. Already hotting up, humid, bright sun. But a cool breeze that felt like air conditioning when it hit my sweaty skin. Ran north through the Welcoming Oaks, past the ancient boulder — no stacked stones, instead a woman standing nearby dressed in the same color combo as me, black on bottom and orange on top. I remember running above the old stone steps, but have absolutely no memory of running on the double bridge. I spent a minute trying to remember anything but couldn’t. I do remember running below the lake street bridge and noticing someone sleeping behind a post. Caught a brief glance of the river, almost sparkling, between the trees but forgot to look at it when I had a clearer and closer view at the bottom of the hill. Heard a drumming woodpecker, saw the brightest, glowiest outfit I’ve seen in a while: pink pants and a red jacket. As I ran by, I could feel the pink yelling excitedly at me, PINK!!!!
Listened to the cars whooshing by as I ran north, then put in “Dear Evan Hansen” as I ran back south.
No bugs, no roller skiers, no chill beats booming out of a scooter’s stereo (heard that yesterday on my walk with Scott and Delia). I did see a scooter zoom by. I think they were on the road, pretending to be a car. No eagles, no squirrels, no big groups of walkers or runners. No rowers, no honking geese. And, hardly any yellow.
Before my run, I found a poem, “Butter,” that made me want to focus on yellow as I ran. I kept returning to the task — look for yellow — but all I could see was blue, green, gray. The only yellow I remember was: the dotted lines on the bike path and the neon crosswalk sign. No yellow shirts or yellow bikes or yellow shorts or yellow cars. No yellow thoughts or yellow voices or yellow light or yellow smells.
The butter poem is the poem of the day on Poetry Foundation. As I read it, I thought about my past love of butter and the story, often told about me, that I liked to melt butter in the microwave and eat it like soup. How many times did I actually do that? It also makes me think of my quote from Audre Lorde about the yellow pellet put in the white butter that spreads, adding the Yes! to our no lives. And it makes me think about Mary Ruefle and her yellow happiness.
Thinking about butter, here are a few images that immediately pop into my head from my childhood:
How uncomfortably scratchy and ticklish my throat felt after drinking the butter soup. Even now 40 years later when I eat butter, I sometimes feel a phantom scratch. Yuck!
Our old popcorn machine had a small metal tray that you put butter in then shoved in a slot so it could melt while the corn popped. I remember pouring the liquid butter over the popcorn, always drenching a few kernels until they were soggy. Even more than using it to melt butter, I remember using the little metal tray to try and catch snowflakes with my sister Marji on a rare snow day in North Carolina.
another butter story about me which I have the thinnest. vaguest memory of: at some restaurants, they would put scoops/balls of butter in a dish on the table. Apparently I ate it like ice cream, either because I thought it was ice cream, or because I liked butter that much.
Butter/ Elizabeth Alexander
My mother loves butter more than I do, more than anyone. She pulls chunks off the stick and eats it plain, explaining cream spun around into butter! Growing up we ate turkey cutlets sauteed in lemon and butter, butter and cheese on green noodles, butter melting in small pools in the hearts of Yorkshire puddings, butter better than gravy staining white rice yellow, butter glazing corn in slipping squares, butter the lava in white volcanoes of hominy grits, butter softening in a white bowl to be creamed with white sugar, butter disappearing into whipped sweet potatoes, with pineapple, butter melted and curdy to pour over pancakes, butter licked off the plate with warm Alaga syrup. When I picture the good old days I am grinning greasy with my brother, having watched the tiger chase his tail and turn to butter. We are Mumbo and Jumbo’s children despite historical revision, despite our parent’s efforts, glowing from the inside out, one hundred megawatts of butter.
Had to look up “tiger Mumbo Jumbo” to find the reference: the story of Little Black Sambo. When we lived in North Carolina, we would often eat at Sambos for breakfast.
Ran a shorter version of the Marshall loop with Scott. We ran for 10 minutes, then walked for 1 minute, 3 times. I liked it as a way to keep everything more relaxed. My heart rate stayed lower too. No rowers on the river, no waffle smells coming out of Black. What else do I remember? Looked for the eagle perched on the dead tree below the lake street bridge. Nothing. Felt the soft salty sand on the edge of the sidewalk on the bridge. Got scratched by some dead branches poking out of a hedge.
A cross-breeze between this life and the imagined one.
I am stuck in an almost life, in an almost time. If I could say,
but I cannot, and so on. Sunlight dizzies through the barren trees,
the skyline, a blue fog against a yellow light, and on the highway
every Westward car blinds me. Every surface reflects
that quiet understanding: decisions have been made, irreversible decisions
to upend beauty for something approximate—the airport hotel,
its Eiffel Tower on the roof, a playground near the public storage.
Beyond, bridges like monuments to fracture, and a sign for Pain Law:
not metaphor, but litigation. Who would not, given acreage
in another’s mind, lie there for a while to watch the sky be sky?
I was drawn to this poem because of its discussion of the almost. I need to spend more time with it to understand, but I feel like Popa thinks of the almost life as a negative, as preventing access to the real (sky as sky). I think of the almost in more positive ways.
Also: Beyond, bridges like monuments to fracture, and a sign for Pain Law:
not metaphor, but litigation.
What does that mean — not metaphor, but litigation?
Another wonderful morning! Maybe a little too warm and sunny for me. I started my run late — almost 10:00 am. Ran through the neighborhood to the lake street bridge. Rowers! 2 or 3 shells with 8 rowers each. I don’t remember what color the water was — probably blue? — but I noticed a few little waves. I hit the lights right and ran all the way up the Marshall hill to Cleveland without stopping. Didn’t stop until I reached the river road a mile later. Walked for a minute and recorded some thoughts about black and darkness into my phone.
Mostly felt strong, but my legs were sore and tired for the last mile. I think I should get my iron levels checked again. Anything else? Didn’t hear the bells at St. Thomas, but heard the roar of a bunch of motorcycles. Encountered 2 kids in a little motorized car on the sidewalk; they were good drivers, giving me lots of space to pass them. I don’t remember hearing birds — I must have? — or seeing roller skiers. Noticed my shadow, sharp and strong next to me at one point.
For the first 3 miles I listened to my breathing or my feet hitting the asphalt or motorcycles. For the last mile and a half, a playlist: “Back in Black,” “Upside Down,” and “I’ll Be There.”
Mary Ruefle and Black Sadness
from My Private Property/ Mary Ruefle
Black sadness is the ashling, its remains are scattered over several provinces, it is the sadness of takes and hypen- ated names, of clouds who think they are grapes, it is the sadness of brooches, which may be worn on the breast or at the neck but how sad none see the sadness of detail there, the woman playing a guitar without strings, the hare leaping from the fox in vain, it is sadness torn and sadness rent, it is the hold in sadness from which no words escape and no soul can spring, it is the calorific sadness of bombs. Many of us used to own a black velvet skirt. It is like Angie Moss on her way to the fair, it is there she will have first adventure.
before the run
Today I will do the Marshall loop which goes by Black, the coffee and waffle place, and I will think about black and the dark and things that don’t echo but absorb, swallow, consume. I’d like to think about the comfort of black/the dark — the shade — in face of too much white/light.
during the run
I did it! I ran past Black and thought about black and darkness a lot. Some of the thoughts are gone, but some managed to stay.
10 Black/Dark Thoughts or Ideas or Images
no Black smells — that is, I don’t recall smelling coffee or the wonderful smells-better-than-it-tastes waffle smell from the coffee and waffle bar
today, with the bright, warm sun, I wanted the cooling darkness of shadows. My run was always felt better out of the bright light. Half the run was in shadows, half in bright light
so many pleasing shadows! Mine, sprawling trees, lamp posts, buildings
I didn’t hear the St. Thomas bells and, as I was nearing campus, I wondered if it was because something — the wind? — was absorbing their sound. Black bells ringing with a black, echo-less sound?
the dark/black mystery of deep trails down into the gorge
I saw a few waves on the river, but no sparkles. Thought about Homer’s wine dark and the idea of water as deep and dark and endless
my running shorts are at least 10 years old and were, at one time, black. Now, faded by the sun, they’re still black but barely, almost a very dark gray
running down the summit hill to the river road trail, thought about light as knowledge, liberated from Plato’s dark cave of shadows, then the dark womb and women’s ways of knowing and how light (and scrutiny and classifying — dissecting) are masculine, patriarchal and privileged over other ways of knowing, which are often read as feminine and less than, or to be overcome
if light = certainty (but does it?) and knowing for sure, what happens when we are finally certain? What ends when the darkness is over?
thought about the idea of black hearts and then what a literal black heart might look like or why someone might have it and then wondered if a literal white heart might not be just as disturbing*
*looking up black heart, I found this interesting discussion of its recent usage:
In the late 20th century, many black scholars, writers, artists, activists, and everyday people began variously using black heart to express pride in and love of their black identity and experience, reclaiming the long, historical racism against blackness. On social media, they may use the black heart emoji, released in 2016, for emphasis.
Much of my thinking about black and darkness during the run was from the perspective of understanding black and dark as good, or not the bad/evil to white’s/light’s good. When I stopped to walk 2.5 miles in, I recorded some of my thoughts:
Thinking about black and dark and how important that (dark) is to poets and to mystery. There’s a difference between pure black that absorbs everything and a dark gray so I’m kind of conflating those, but it’s the idea of dark as essential and how light can be too bright. The idea of certainty, where you can see everything in its sharp lines and finally know it, is a conclusion, an ending to the mystery. To life. So, that’s not to say that light and certainty aren’t important but they are not the good to dark’s bad.
I think these ideas made more sense in my head. I should say that much of my thinking about black and dark was particularly inspired by a quote I encountered yesterday about hope being a language that dark voices cannot understand — it was the title of a student’s musical composition at FWA’s concert. When I first heard the quote, I was bothered by the idea of dark voices, which could (and has — I’ve taken entire grad classes on it) be connected to actual dark voices, that is, the voices of Black people, so it literally means we don’t need the dark voices of Black people. I also thought about how light gets connected with seeing, which then becomes the dominant way to access truth. So, if you can’t see well — you’re blind, or going blind like me — it’s understood that there’s something wrong with you.
note: I feel like I have too much to say about all of this, which is causing me to struggle to say anything coherent. Maybe I’m not ready to express it yet?
Anyway, all of that was happening in my head as I ran. None if it stayed too long, only flaring then flying away. One of the last thoughts I remember having was, dark voices absolutely understand the language of hope and they are my primary resources for finding and holding onto it! This thought is true for me literally and figuratively. In both my master’s thesis and dissertation, I studied the deeply rich and messy and complicated tragic hope of critical race theorists (especially Cornell West) and black feminists and womanists (Audre Lorde, Patricia Hill Collins, Alice Walker). And now, ever since 2016, I’ve been looking to poetry and poets, for their safeguarding of bewilderment and mystery and their understandings of hope that come from a sharing of joy that is both grief and delight.
after the run
At the end of the run, and now almost 2 hours after it, I’ve arrived here, thinking that not only is the belief that darkness is bad or that there’s no room for dark voices in the light of hope is problematic, it is ridiculous. How can you have hope without grappling with the dark thoughts of mystery, uncertainty, unknowingness? And how can you have a hope that’s strong enough to help us build better futures for everyone if dark voices aren’t at the center of it?
Wow, this topic really got me going! In the past, I might have taken all of this out, but I’ll keep it for future Sara.
One more random note about black. Ruefle’s idea of black sadness as the hold from which no words can spring, no soul can escape,” reminded me of a favorite line from Rainer Maria Rilke’s “Black Cat“:
A ghost, though invisible, still is like a place your sight can knock on, echoing; but here within this thick black pelt, your strongest gaze will be absorbed and utterly disappear:
Breezy and sunny. Felt a little tired during the run; maybe I should have had a snack right before I left? Encountered an adult and a cute little kid on the trail, then another cute kid sitting on the rock that looks like a chair. She called out hello! I waved back. I remember looking at the river but not what it looked like. I remember hearing voices below me, seeing lots of leaning trees, feeling the uneven path below my feet.
Mary Ruefle and Orange Sadness
Orange sadness is the sadness of anxiety and worry, it is the sadness of an orange balloon drifting over snow- capped mountains, the sadness of wild goats, the sadness of counting, as when one worries that another shipment of thoughts is about to enter the house, that a soufflé or Cessna will fall on the one day set aside to be unsad, it is the orange haze of a fox in the distance, it speaks the strange antlered language of phantoms and dead batter- ies, it is the sadness of all things left overnight in the oven and forgotten in the morning, and as such orange sadness becomes lost among us altogether, like its motive.
before the run
Today I’d like to think (even) more about orange. What is orange to me? What sounds orange? Tastes orange? Feels orange? Smells orange?
during the run
I tried to think about orange, testing out whether I thought something I encountered felt orange or not. Would I call those loud voices below me orange voices? No. Ran down the hill to the south entrance of the winchell trail and smelled the vaguest whiff of the past — the sweet, fresh smell at my family’s farm in the UP. Is that an orange smell? Nope. I’d call it a red smell because when I think of the farm, I think of the bright red of the farmhouse. I noticed lots of little orange things on the ground — orange leaves, a piece of orange string, an orange flash. As I neared the gravel hill at the ravine, I started thinking about orange theory and its main principle of working out in the orange heart rate/effort zone for at least 12 minutes of a 60 minute workout. Running up the gravel on my toes, I thought about orange breaths and orange effort and decided that when I got home, I looked up the orange theory and think more about it.
after the run
Here’s how Orange Theory defines the different zones:
Gray Zone (50-60% Maximum Heart Rate) – This is the least strenuous, most comfortable zone, consisting of very light activity.
Blue Zone (61-70% Maximum Heart Rate) – This zone is specifically geared for warm-up and cool-down exercises. You are preparing your body and mind for high-intensity interval training, but you haven’t unleashed the burn just yet.
Green Zone (71-83% Maximum Heart Rate) – In this zone, you have reached a challenging but doable pace. This is what Orangetheory categorizes as “Base Pace,” a pace you can maintain for 20-30 total minutes. Your body starts to burn fat and carbohydrates evenly.
Orange Zone (84-91% Maximum Heart Rate) – This is where the magic happens and where you achieve “EPOC” (Excess Post-Exercise Oxygen Consumption) – what we call the “Orange Effect / Afterburn.” The goal is to accumulate 12 minutes or more in this zone within a 60-minute period to achieve the maximum caloric burn for up to 36 hours AFTER your workout is completed.
Red Zone (92-100% Maximum Heart Rate) – This zone happens organically and may be achieved during ‘All Out’ efforts when you’re emptying the tank and using every ounce of energy left in your body. You don’t need to set an All Out pace for more than 1 minute at a time to experience maximum results.
I haven’t really worked with heart rate zones when I run, partly because I can’t seem to not stay in the upper range on all of my runs no matter how slow I go, but it seems fun to me to think about orange in terms of effort and heart rate and how that could apply to things outside of (or alongside?) fitness. The orange zone involves a hard effort, where you are doing things that elevate your heart rate a lot, but it’s not all out, not something that makes your heart almost jump out of your chest or pound uncontrollably. That’s red, and a red (all out effort) breath might involve being shocked, experiencing such intense awe or surprise that you lose your breath for a minute. Orange breaths involve intense feeling that can be sustained longer, but are still uncomfortable. Orange breaths are anxious breaths. This morning, as I waited to leave for a doctor appointment, I was breathing with orange breaths and orange lungs — wound up, nervous, not totally sure why. Every time, before an open swim, I breathe orange breaths — nervous about whether or not I will be able to see how to swim across, excited about getting to swim in the lake.
For today’s run, I decided to go past the falls to Longfellow Gardens. Since I was reading Mary Ruefle’s prose poem about purple sadness, my plan was to visit my favorite purple flowers. When I reached the gardens I discovered that they haven’t been planted yet. Thanks strange spring with your late snow storms and unending cold weather in April!
Another one of those wonderful spring days with sunshine and birdsong. A week ago I would have added “no bugs,” but they’ve arrived. All this week, mosquitoes have been feasting on my elbows, under my knees, my wrist. Today a gnat died on the side of my nose. I could see it through my peripheral vision. Another flew into my eye. Yuck!
My right big toe hurt again for a few minutes, then it was fine.
Heard the wind, water gushing out of the sewer pipes, the falls roaring, kids laughing at the playground, one little kid in a stroller that was over everything, a giant mower or weed whacker or some other noisy machine near the Longfellow House.
Smelled cigarette smoke as I passed a guy on the trail. Was he smoking or was it just his clothes?
surfaces: tightly packed dirt, half buried tree roots, grass, hay, asphalt, concrete, road, street, sidewalk, brick, dead leaves, crumbling asphalt — some mostly asphalt, some with big chunks of asphalt mixed with leaves and dirt, some rubble, limestone steps
Mary Ruefle, Immortal Cupboards, Windows, Offerings, and a Purple Wood
Today I’m reading Ruefle’s lecture, “My Emily Dickinson” and her purple sadness poem.
immortal cupboards
J. D. Salinger once remarked, “A writer, when he’s asked to discuss his craft, ought to get up and call out in a loud voice just the names of the writers he loves…”
“My Emily Dickinson” / Mary Ruefle, page 150
That lovely little book. I’ve had nothing affect me quite so much since I discovered haiku. But then you come from Japan! You now inhabit a corner of my immortal cupboard with LZ (especially the short poems), Emily Dickinson, Thoreau, Lucretius, Marcus Aurelius, John Muir, bits from Santayana, D.H. Lawrence, Dahlberg, William Carlos Williams, and haiku. These knew “when / to listen / what falls / glistens now / in the ear.”
Emily Dickinson is also in my immortal cupboard, along with Mary Oliver, Lorine Niedecker, Marie Howe, possibly Alice Oswald, definitely Rita Dove.
windows
Emily Dickinson often looked out of her bedroom window, and many of her poems, if not her worldview, seem framed by this fact; so much has been made of this there is little I can add; to argue whether a window is the emblem of complete objectivity (removal and distance) or complete subjectivity (framing and viewpoint) is an argument without end, for every window has two sides, and they are subsumed in the window, the way yearning, a subsidiary of the window, is subsumed in both the object yearned for, and the subject of its own activity.
“My Emily Dickinson”/ Mary Ruefle, page 151
offerings
But she has a common grave, and I like to go there and leave things, and when I did, I see that many other people have done the same.
“My Emily Dickinson” / Mary Ruefle, page 182
list of offerings left (real or imagined) throughout Ruefle’s lecture:
a stone, a penny, a small bronze alien
two plastic champagne glasses, pink and purple larkspur, an ear
a lemon, a dime, a diamond ring, a parachute
a white rose, a fortune-telling passionate fish, ice cream for astronauts
a sheaf of flowers from the florist with a thank-you note attached, a plastic fly, a nickel, an egg
A stick of gum wrapped in foil. A shard of glass.
a plastic watch, a feather, some Kleenex
Nothing.
lilacs, a spool of thread, a book of matches, a mood ring
an envelope, addressed but otherwise empty, a piece of gum in silver paper, a packet of nasturtium seeds, and a button
a thimble, an acorn, a quarter, and many, many daffodils
yellow snapdragons. A robin made of tin. A child’s block with the letter E. A pen. A pinecone. A tiny hat. An Austrailian coin.
a paratrooper, a cork
s piece of coal, a candle stub, a chrysanthemum
a small gargoyle, a rubber heart, an old key, a guitar pick a sequin, a sprig of heather, and a piece of hair
A doorknob.
a purple wood
A lane of yellow led the eye Unto a Purple Wood Whose soft inhabitants to be Surpasses solitude (Emily Dickinson)
from My Private Property/ Mary Ruefle
Purple sadness is the sadness of classical music and eggplant, the stroke of midnight, human organs, ports cut off for a part of every year, words with too many meanings, incense, insomnia, and the crescent moon. It is the sadness of play money, and icebergs seen from a canoe. It is possible to dance to purple sadness, though slowly, as slowly as it takes to dig a pit to hold a sleeping giant. Purple sadness is pervasive, and goes deeper into the interior than the world’s greatest nickel deposits, or any other sadness on earth. It is the sadness of depositories, and heels echoing down a long corridor, it it the sound of your mother closing the door at night, leaving you alone.
Just discovered how the ends of her lines create another poem:
Stroke words it is possible to dig a pit deeper into sadness a long leaving
The last words, leaving you alone, reminds me of Ruefle’s discussion of Emily Bronté, and Emily Dickinson in My Emily Dickinson:
Emily Dickinson never lived alone for a single day in her life. Emily Bronté never lived alone for a single day in her life.
before the run
Today on my run, I want to think about purple, and I plan to run the 2+ miles it takes to get to longfellow gardens where some of my favorite purple flowers dwell (or have dwelled in past springs). What are these flowers called? I have no idea.
other purples to think about: heels echoing, doors creaking closed, deep pits.
during the run
No flowers. well, I did find some flowers that were white, but looked like they could be or would be or should be turning purple. Also, a reddish-purple plant. I took some pictures:
tiny purple flowers (if you really believe)a reddish, purplish plant
I can’t really see any purple in these, or much of anything, but maybe you can?
Other purple things I remember encountering: the gentle, queer curve of a branch towering over the trail — as I ran under it I thought, that’s very purple. Then the face of a child in the midst of bellowing frustration — I didn’t see their face, but I imagined it could be a deep purple. Purple whispers in the trees.
No purple cars or shirts or shoes or bikes or signs or birds or left behind objects in the grass. Mostly just green and blue.
after the run
Apparently the leaving of strange offerings at Emily Dickinson’s grave is a thing. In her play on Susan Howe’s My Emily Dickinson and Ruefle’s My Emily Dickinson, Meg Shevenock writes, in My My Emily Dickinson:
Then, there’s this: after visiting Emily’s house, my friends and I made a small parade to visit her grave, and the objects I knew would be there, were there. Best of all, a white plastic pen with white cap from a hotel. Or best of all, a blue pencil cracked and dried, that had weathered so much snow. We all want her to say more, write more, about who she was; or, we want to say, I get it, I’m a writer too, and we also know it’s impossible, so we leave an object from the world, from a day long beyond her breathing, to get as close to touching as stone.
Another beautiful morning. Sun, birds, clear paths. The big toe on my right foot hurt for the first 5 minutes. Not sure what’s wrong with it, but it started hurting a few weeks ago. A similar thing happened when I was breaking in a new pair of running shoes 2 years ago. Is it because of the new running shoes I started wearing last month? The pain went away by the time I reached lake street and didn’t return.
Ran to franklin then down the hill to annie young meadows. Turned around and took the steps down to the path right next to the retaining wall and the river. The path was covered in soft sand because of the recent flood. Ran to the bottom of the franklin hill, then walked about 1/2 of it. Put in Taylor Swift’s Midnights for the rest of the run.
I encountered 2 roller skiers and one rollerblader! Don’t think I heard any clicking or clacking of ski poles. No rowers. A few bikers, at least one fat tire.
Mary Ruefle and Blue Sadness
before the run
from My Private Property/ Mary Ruefle
Blue sadness is sweetness cut into strips with scissors and then into little pieces by a knife, it is the sadness of reverie and nostalgia: it may be, for example, the memory of a happiness that is now only a memory, it has receded into a niche that cannot be dusted for it is beyond your reach; distinct and dusty, blue sadness lies in your inability to dust it, it is as unreachable as the sky, it is a fact reflecting the sadness of all facts. Blue sadness is that which you wish to forget, but cannot, as when on a bus one suddenly pictures with absolute clarity a ball of dust in a closet, such an odd, unshareable thought that one blushes, a deep rose spreading over the blue fact of sadness, creating a situation that can only be compared to a temple, which exists, but to visit in one would have to travel two thousand miles on snowshoes and by dogsled, five hundred by horseback and another five hundred by boat, with a thousand by rail.
during the run
I wanted to think about blue as I ran. At first flash, lots of things looked blue — cars, t-shirts, the trail. Most of them turned gray or black or anything but blue when I looked at them for longer. It’s funny how when I’m thinking about a color, that’s what my brain sees everywhere. I did see a few blue t-shirts, a bright blue bike parked by the trestle, blue signs, blue sky.
The sky was a pale blue, which made me think of the Ted Kooser line from his poem, “Turkey Vultures” — it is as if they were smoothing one of those tissue paper sewing patterns over the pale blue fabric of the air. I wondered why the sky was a pale blue and not a bright blue and whether it was my vision or something about how the light was (or wasn’t?) scattering.
At one point, I heard a creak somewhere and thought: a blue creak. I think that was the only blue sound I recall hearing.
after the run
Re-reading Ruefle’s blue sadness, I’m thinking about how blue light comes in short, choppy waves that scatter more than red or green waves and how Ruefle’s understanding of blue seems to invoke that: strips and pieces of sweetness, memory — nostalgia, reverie, dust, a temple, scattered and out of reach on a shelf, in a far off land.
I don’t think about blue that often and it doesn’t conjure up powerful images for me. My eyes rarely see blue lights on signs. I suppose I think of water, but the water I see/swim in is rarely blue. Perhaps my favorite blues are: the blue hour early on a winter morning, snow looking blue, cerulean, frozen blueberries (not fresh)
Since it was a late Sunday morning on a beautiful day, I decided to avoid the river road path. I ran on Edmund and the grassy boulevard instead. My left hip and knee felt a little sore, and the run didn’t always feel easy, but it was still great to be outside moving. The thing I remember most was the birds at the beginning. So many chirps and tweets and trills. Much louder near my house than by the river.
Greeted Dave, the Daily Walker. Encountered a lot of bikers, runners, a big group of walkers in matching black shirts, 3 kids playing basketball out in the street.
Overheard a conversation and intended to remember what one of the woman said, but I forgot within a few minutes.
Tried to run in the shade, avoid the warm sun. Felt overdressed in shorts and short-sleeved shirt. Next time: tank top.
Looked for turkeys in turkey hollow. Didn’t see even one. Looked at the window of the poem house. Still the same poem from last December.
At the end of the run, as I was walking home, I pulled out my phone, planning to practice reciting the poem I re-memorized the morning — “Writing a Poem”– into it, but there were several people nearby and I felt self-conscious. I was inspired to re-memorize this poem because of the loud weed whacker that was buzzing in my brain late yesterday morning while I was trying to read Mary Ruefle. So loud! It’s dzzzzzzzzzz (not the dizz dizz dizz of the poem) taking over everything.
This morning, during my usual routine or reading poems.org, I discovered this wonderful interview with the poet, Sarah Audsley. There are many things in this interview I’d like to revisit, but especially this:
FWR: You’re also a self-described rural poet. How would you say place and/or the pastoral influence your writing?
Sarah Audsley: “The rural poet” seems like it is in contention with “the city poet.” For me, maybe it is! Because, for me, place and my connection to place is essential. I enjoy visiting cities and being an interloper in city life, but I will always choose to live in a rural place. Walking my dog three times a day, cross country skiing in the winter, and hiking in the mountains in the summer, offsets all the daily computer grind. I like to think, too, that it feeds the work. To put it in another way, I’m a better poet if I’ve spent some time outside noticing and moving in the woods. The natural world offers me a sense of belonging. So, of course, this will appear in the poems. As for the pastoral poetry tradition, two poets and influences come to mind: Vievee Francis and the “anti-pastoral” poems in Forest Primeval, and Jennifer Chang’s Bread Loaf Lecture, “Other Pastorals: Writing Race and Place” (June 2019, available here.)
Mary Ruefle, “On Secrets”
Secret #7
Every word carries a secret inside itself; it’s called etymology.
It is the DNA of a word. To crack or press a word is to use its etymology to reveal its secrets, all still embedded in the direct action of ancient and original metaphor.
page 91
The psychic energy required and used in writing a poem is also a secret. Where did it come from? How did it get here and where is it going?
These are the questions we ask ourselves when we write, and these are the questions an astronomer asks of the stars.
Consider the word consider, which originally meant “to observe the stars.”
Consideration leads to comprehension, which originally meant “to grasp, to seize something with the hands and hold it tight in the arms”: what the mother does with the child. To hold, to put one’s arms around.
As Jung once wittily noted: “When the neurotic complains that the world does not understand him, he is telling us in a word that he want his mother.”
And who among us is not neurotic, and has never complained that they are not understood? Why did you come here, to this place, if not in the hope of being understood, of being in some small way comprehended by your peers, and embraced by them in a fellowship of shared secrets?
I don’t know about you, but I just want to be held.
To say that consideration leads to comprehension is to say that observation leads to action. The tasks of the outside world must be observed and then embraced privately, just as the astronomer looks through his telescope, considers the stars, and embraces the universe in the closed space of his mind.
Enter the cold dark matter.
Enter the anti-secret of every word. There is no comprehension. Our comprehension is limited. Language can only hold for a moment before the embrace disintegrates.
pages 92-94
The two sides of a secret are repression and expression, just as the two sides of poem are the told and the untold. We must be careful not to take the word as the meaning itself; words no not “capture” a moment as much as they “communicate” it—they are a bridge that, paradoxically, breaks isolation and loneliness without eradicating it. It is the first experience you ever had of reading a decent poem: “Ph, somebody else is lonely, too!”
Secret #9
In the end I would rather wonder than know.
* Because I would rather wonder than know, my interests and talents lie in the arts rather than the sciences, although, like the monk who discovered champagne–an accidental event that unexpectedly happened to his wine–I have on occasion come running with open arms toward another with the news, “Look! I am drinking the stars!”
page 101
I would rather wonder than know. Yes!
a few hours later: Scrolling through instagram I found a poem by Laura Gilpin:
The things I know: how the living go on living and how the dead go on living with them So that in a forest even a dead tree casts a shadow and the leaves fall one by one and the branches break in the wind and the bark peels off slowly and the trunk cracks and the rain seeps in through the cracks and the trunk falls to the ground and the moss covers it
and in the spring the rabbits find it and build their nest inside and their young will live safely and have their young inside the dead tree So that nothing is wasted in nature or in love.
I like this poem; I also like the title of the book it’s from — The Hocus-Pocus of the Universe — which made me remember a line from Ruefle’s lecture on secrets:
the sacred word is a secret and cannot be spoken without consequence, be it blessing or curse. There is simply too much power in certain words, and the unnerving force of naming casts a great spell over language and, in one very important sense, created poetry, since to invoke sacred powers, bypass words were employed, incantations without any meaning at all, such as abracadabra, words that of course became imbued with as much power as what they were trying to invoke. And then, as often happens, it worked in reverse, so that very sacred words or phrases bypassed themselves, through a living version of the parlor game Password, where a word is passed or repeated from ear to ear until it changes into gibberish. To my mind, the most paralyzing example of this process is one origin theory of the term hocus-pocus, that it was once hoc est corpus — This is my body ….”
Warmer today. The river was glittering as I ran above it, over the lake street bridge. Ended up at the St. Thomas Campus just after graduation was ending. Oops. Crowded sidewalks, a huge group of people waiting behind me at the stop light. A few near misses with people taking over the sidewalk.
I almost forgot — at the very beginning of my run, one block from my house, I heard someone playing Take Five on their saxophone inside somewhere. Then I saw someone working in their front yard and I thought — it’s nice to be outside in the city in the midst of other people doing their Saturday late morning things.
Anything else? no smells or things tasted that I recall. the feel of soft sandy grit on the edge of the bridge sidewalk, softer and deeper than on other parts of the trail. different voices after graduation, talking about parties and parking and — ? saw the shadow of a bird pass over my head.
Mary Ruefle, “Introduction” to Madness, Rack, and Honey
allegiance to poetry
my allegiance to poetry, to art, is greater than my allegiance to knowledge and intelligence, and that stance is harder and harder to maintain in today’s world, because knowledge and intelligence form the corporate umbrella (the academy) that shelters and protects poetry in a culture that cares about other things.
a definition of poetry
I do not think I really have anything to say about poetry other than remarking that it is a wandering little drift of unidentified sound, and trying to say more reminds me of following the sound of a thrush into the woods on a summer’s eve–if you persist in following the thrush it will only recede deeper and deeper into the woods; you will never actually see the thrush (the hermit thrush is especially shy), but I suppose listening is a kind of knowledge, or as close as one can come, “Fret not after knowledge, I have none,” is what the trhursh says. Perhaps we can use our knowledge to preserve a bit of space where his lack of knowledge can survive.
I love this idea of preserving space for things outside of knowledge or what is considered intelligible by those in power. I remember now running across the lake street bridge and thinking about the value of space and room to breathe and be in as many ways as possible.
Wore my orange sweatshirt today. Partly cloudy, cooler, some wind. My legs felt like logs until I warmed up, about a mile into the run. Listened to some blue jays screeching, kids laughing, old guys talking. Forgot to look at the river or listen for the falls. Avoided a BIG school group above the falls — 4 or 5 full-sized school buses in the parking lot. Didn’t stop to walk up the small hill at the veterans’ home. Kept running until I reached 4 miles then walked while I put in my headphones. I listened to Lizzo for the last minutes of the run — Hi motherfuckers, did you miss me? I’ve been home since 2020. I’ve been twerkin’ and making smoothies. It’s called healing and I feel better. I love Lizzo.
Mary Ruefle and the madness of wasting time
continuing my discussion of her lecture, “Madness, Rack, and Honey.”
before the run
A few of the poets/writers Ruefle cites talk about nothing — the Great Nothing (Tess Gallagher), doing nothing (Gertrude Stein). I’m thinking about Auden and Ross Gay and the idea of making nothing happen, which I recently wrote about on march 29, 2023.
during the run
Every so often during the run, I thought about nothing and being useless — at least if usefulness is measured by capitalism and its values. At one point I thought about my running and writing practice — how much time I’ve put into it, or how much time I’ve wasted on it. Here I’m thinking about wasting time as something a poet (or someone who writes poetry) needs, desires.
after the run
I’m revising a few of my mood ring poems in order to submit all of them for a chapbook contest, so I don’t ave a lot of time to spend on reading Ruefle. For now, here’s a little bit on madness:
madness
The madness of poetry is that it creates sweetness, so that the flies might come and eat till it is gone. “To endlessly make an end of things,” says Paul Celan in a poem, and that’s it, inexplicably and exactly. ”
*
If the flies keep feasting, the honey will be gone. Then the flies will go away. And there will be nothing sweet. The poet has to either begin again–poor Creature!–or write a poem that goes on forever, and what a torment that would be! Even the long poem ends.
The perfect temperature for a spring run. The light looked strange. Filtered through trees, clouds, haze? it looked almost pink or light orangish-pink. I liked it. Everything, everywhere thick with green.
note, 19 may, 2023: talked with Scott and RJP about the strange light, which has continued: forest fires
I greeted the Welcoming Oaks and good morninged Mr. Morning! and another regular — did I ever name him? Maybe it was Mr. Holiday?
I chanted in triple berries to keep a steady rhythm — strawberry blueberry raspberry — and tried to stop thinking or noticing anything, to just be on the path, moving and breathing. What did I notice anyway?
10 Things I Noticed When I Wasn’t Noticing
2 stones stacked on the ancient boulder
down in the flats, the river was moving fast. I tried to race it
white foam on the river, under the I-94 bridge I thought (or hoped?) it was a rowing shell
a fat tire bike sped down the franklin hill, abruptly turned at annie young meadow and almost ran into a parked car, then called out to the guy in the car — his friend — Hey!
the bucket of a big crane curled under the franklin bridge with a worker in it, studying the underside of the bridge
a guy walking on edmund in a bright yellow vest, no other vest wearers or official vehicles in sight
a runner coming down the other franklin hill — the one near the dog park — then entering the river road trail 25 yards? ahead of me
smell: pot, down in the flats
a woman stopped at the edge of the trail, looking through a camera lens at a tree on the other side of the road. I thought about calling out, what’s in the tree?, but didn’t
the weeds on the edge of the trail, poking out of cracks in the asphalt looked monstrous — now I can’t remember what I thought they were at first, just not weeds
bonus: a turkey! chilling in the grassy boulevard between edmund and the river road
I don’t really remember what I heard as I ran without headphones toward franklin. After stopping 3/4 of the way up the hill to walk, I put in music. I thought I put in Lizzo’s Special but I must have forgot to tap something because when I hit the play button it was Dear Evan Hansen again. Oh well.
Mary Ruefle, “Madness, Rack, and Honey”
Last night during Scott’s community jazz band rehearsal, after our regular community band rehearsal, when I sit for an hour and try to read or write or think about my poetry, I started Ruefle’s titular lecture (is that the correct way to use titular?). Now, after my run, I’m back at it again. This lecture is a chewy bagel and I’m determined to not spend too much time on it.
The title is strange — what does she mean by madness, rack, and honey? — and I was pleased to discover that she devotes the lecture to explaining the title. She begins with a Persian poem:
I shall not finish my poem. What I have written is so sweet The flies are beginning to torment me.
honey:
It is so simple and clear: the “figurative” sweetness of the author’s verse has become honey, causing “literal” flies to swarm on the page or in around the autor’s ead. This is truly the Word made flesh, the fictive made real, water into wine. That is the honey of poetry: the miracle of its transformation, which is that of creation: once there was a blank page–scary!–now there is something in its place that is attracting flies. Anyone who has not experienced the joy, pleasure, transport, and who has not experienced the joy, pleasure, transport, and sweetness of writing poems has not written poems.
pages 130-131
rack:
Enter the flies who feast. For the poem clearly reminds us that honey has complications–those flies are beginning to torment the poet. Torment, pain, torture, is what I mean by the rack.
page 134
It is what poetry does to the world, what poets do with words, and what words will do to a poet. And that’s the rack of it. And if you have never experienced the rack while working on a poem then you have have never worked on a poem. Have you never put language in an extenuating circumstance with dangerous limits until an acute physical sensation results?
page 135
And, if I have time, I’ll return for madness later today.
One more thing to post before I go eat lunch. Instead of posting the poem, which I also like, I’m only posting the poet’s explanation of it.
“Sometimes you hear a word as if for the first time, a word you’ve been saying your whole life. I don’t know what in the brain allows the word, in that moment, to reveal itself, but it always makes me feel very smart and very foolish at once. This poem was written during the period when I had just gotten into gardening and was gaining a new appreciation for everything—food, nature, and time. I wonder what else is waiting to reveal itself to me in such a way, and whether I’ll be distracted enough to receive it.” —Jeremy Radin
Now I’m thinking of the opening lines from Marie Howe’s “The Meadow”: As we walk into words that have waitedfor us to enter them…is this idea of walking into words similar to words (and new meanings) revealing themselves to us? As I write this question, I’m reminded of a Mary Ruefle piece in My Private Property: “In the Forest”
When I wander in the forest I am drawn towards language, I see meaning is quaintly hidden, shooting up in dark wet woods, by roots of trees, old walls, among dead leaves…
page 74
And these lines helped me to remember a thought I had as I ran this morning on the part of the pedestrian path that dips below the bike path, the two separated by a slight rise and some bushes. When I first started to run this trail, almost 10 years ago, I was a little afraid of taking this lower trail. It was hidden from the road and other people and I wondered if someone might be lurking, waiting for me. Today I thought, how could I have been afraid of this short part of the path, only hidden from view for a few seconds? It does seem ridiculous.
Wow! A beautiful spring morning. Sunny, low wind, birds. Favorite part of the run was hearing, then seeing, the geese under the ford bridge. Honking as they flew low then landing in the river, their feet skimming the water — what a beautiful sound that is — not sure how to describe the sound of a bird coming in for a landing.
Listened to the birds, no specific bird, just BIRDS!, as I ran south, then put in “Dear Evan Hansen” at the top of the hill and listened to that as I ran north.
Mostly my body felt strong and sore, especially the big toe on my right foot.
Mary Ruefle, “On Fear”
before the run
The second form of dread is the anticipatory dread of pain, either physical, emotional, spiritual, or psychological, and that, folks, covers nine-tenths of the world’s surface.
Ruefle lists Julian of Norwich’s 4 forms of dread: dread form 1 = emotion fear — your very first response to smell of smoke dread form 3 = doubt or despair dread form 4 = hold dread with which we face that we which we love the most
Dread. I like it better than the word fear because fear, like the unconscious emotion which is one of its forms, has only the word ear inside of it, telling an animal to listen, while dread has the word read inside of it, telling us to read carefully and find the dead, who are are also there.
For some reason, this word play reminded me of a delightful poem I read by Kelli Agodon Russell a few months ago:
Believing Anagrams/ Kelli Agodon Russell
—after being asked why I write so many poems about death and poetry
there’s real fun in funeral, and in the pearly gates—the pages relate.
You know, i fall prey to poetry,
have hated death.
all my life, literature has been my ritual tree—
Shakespeare with his hearse speak, Pablo Neruda, my adorable pun.
So when i write about death and poetry, it’s donated therapy
where i converse with Emily Dickinson, my inky, misled icon.
and when my dream songs are demon’s rags, i dust my manuscript in a manic spurt
hoping the reader will reread because i want the world
to pray for poets as we are only a story of paper.
This poem is from her collection, Letters from the Emily Dickinson Room. It seems fitting to read and post this poem on Emily Dickinsons death date — May 15, 1886. I love her anagram for Emily Dickinson: inky, misled icon
during the run
I thought about reciting Dickinson poems as I started running, but forgot about it before I even reached the river. Near the end of the run, while I listened to “Dear Evan Hansen,” I thought about fear and dread and wondered where worry fit in.
after the run
I’m slowly reading more of Ruefle’s “On Fear”:
She talks about the difference between emotions (instinct) and feelings (cognitive), and emergencies of feeling. She lists what other poets have said about fear, then lists her fears. And she returns to Julian of Norwich:
“Fear and dread are brothers,” says Julian of Norwich. As desire is wanting and fear is not-wanting.
After this mention of Norwich, Ruefle devotes several pages to Keats and his idea of negative capabilities. I’ll leave a discussion of that for another day, when I have time.
She ends with a reference to Emily Dickinson, which, like Russell’s poem seems fitting to include:
What has life taught me? I am much less afraid than I ever was in my youth–of everything. That is a fact. At the same time, I feel more afraid than ever. And the two, I can assure you, are not opposed but inextricably linked. I am more or less the same age Emily Dickinson was when she died. Here is what she thought: “Had we the first intimation of the Definition of Life, the calmest of us would be Lunatics!” The calm lunatic–now that is something to aspire to.
The passage from ED comes from a letter and also includes these wonderful lines:
There is a Dove in the Street and I own beautiful Mud – so I know Summer is coming. I was always attached to Mud, because of what it typifies – also, perhaps, a Child’s tie to primeval Pies.
I had a terror-since September-I could tell to none-and so I sing, as the Boy does by the Burying Ground-because I am afraid-
The second I’m including because I find it delightful:
You ask of my Companions Hills- Sir-and the Sundown-and a Dog-large as myself, that my Father bought me-They are better than Beings-because they know-but do not tell-and the noise in the Pool, at Noon – excels my Piano.
