Sun! Sun! Finally some sun! After days of gloom, sun and warmer air. Birds. Snow all gone. Greenish grass. It feels like spring. An unpopular opinion, but as much as I like this weather, I want some snow. Big fluffy flakes to run through. The silence only a blanket of snow can create. Crisp, cold air. I’m sure we’ll get some in February.
Ran to the lake for a specific reason: I wanted to see if Painted Turtle, the restaurant, has made any progress on building a structure so they can serve beer this summer. Nope — at least, now that I could see.
The lake still has a thick layer of ice, but the surface is wet and blue. Such a beautiful, intense blue. I don’t think I saw anyone out in the middle on the ice — did I just forgot to look? Or is too wet or too thin?
10 Things
Ran over the recently redone duck bridge, noticed it squeaking
a sparkling river
a truck making a racket as it went over a bump — the noisiest part were its rattling chains
no ice on the creek, no water in the swampy area in my favorite part of the path
what I thought was a teacher’s shrill whistle at the playground was a bird, calling repeatedly
still working on nokomis avenue, had to cross over to the sidewalk
lots of mud near the lake — again, no snow
walking by my favorite bench at the big beach, imagining myself sitting there this summer and my suit, waiting for open swim to begin
no poem on the window at the house that used to put up a poem on their front window
many friendly, kind people on the sidewalk moving over for me to pass
Earlier this morning, reading the Longfellow Messenger, I found an article about Edmund Avenue — the one I’ve mentioned many times here. The Edmund is after Edmund Walton who was the first developer to do a racial covenant on the properties he was selling. He did this in 1910. Some people want to change the name. I’m with them. Racial covenants are terrible; we had one on our house that we didn’t realize was there and just filed paperwork to get it removed a few weeks ago. And, it’s not in the past; our neighborhood, and all of Minneapolis, is still shaped by who could and couldn’t buy a home here. The article mentioned a site: Reclaiming Edmund
2.1 miles river road, north/dorman/loons coffee 37 degrees / humidity: 90%
Ran with Scott up the river road and over to a coffee place. The air was so thick with moisture, which made it harder to breathe. Otherwise a good run. We talked about The Muppet Movie, which we watched last night, and how it didn’t dumb down (or try to purify) the characters or their relationships. Then I rambled on for a few minutes about what a rich, messy character Miss Piggy was and how there was such a variety of representations of love within the movie.
10+ Things
encountered and greeted a woman in a bright red jacket, almost the same color as Scott’s
passed a woman in a blue jacket — she’s a Regular that I should name. I see her often. The thing I remember most is that she’s always wearing a long skirt or dress. In the winter, she also wears a ski jacket and tights, in the summer just the dress. I’m not sure what to call her — all dressed up?
near the tunnel of trees the river is still white
everyone else the river is open — a deep dark gray
heard some cardinals, at least one black-capped chickadee
the ghost bike — June’s bike — at the trestle was wreathed in dried flowers
the ravine, between the 35th and 36th street parking lots had an open view and was only half covered in snow
4 stones stacked on the ancient boulder
bright orange striped barrel blocking the way down the old stone steps
a lone black glove, looking forlorn on the biking path
a SUV honking unnecessarily and repeatedly at a pedestrian near Minnehaha Academy
Here’s a poem I don’t want to forget by Jane Hirshfield:
Many capacities have been thought to define the human— yet finches and wasps use tools; speech comes into this world in many forms. Perhaps it is you, Opinion.
Though I cannot know for certain, I doubt the singing dolphins have opinions.
This thought of course, is you.
A mosquito’s estimation of her meal, however subtle, is not an opinion. That’s my opinion, too.
To think about you is to step into your arms? a thicket? pitfall?
When you come rising strongly in me, I feel myself grow separate and more lonely. Even when others share you, this is so.
Darwin said no fact or description that fails to support an argument can serve.
Myoe wrote: Bright, bright, bright, bright, the moon.
Last night there were whole minutes when you released me. Ocean ocean ocean was the sound the sand made of the moonlit waves breaking on it.
I felt no argument with any part of my life.
Not even with you, Opinion, who drifted in salt waters with the bullwhip kelp and phosphorescent plankton, nibbling my legs and ribcage to remind me where Others end and I begin.
(added a few hours later): I almost forgot to mention that this entry is my 2000th post. Not every single one of these entries is about a run, but most of them are. Wow. When I started this project to document marathon training in 2017, I had no idea where it might lead! So happy I’m still here writing and running and noticing!
Hooray for warm (but not too warm) mornings and clear paths and flying geese and frozen rivers and runners in electric blue running tights and frozen seeps and weeping springs and brief visits from shadows and squirrels that don’t dart and not slipping on the few spots where there was snow and chirping birds and laughing woodpeckers and clicking blue jay jaws and running down hills then walking back up them and winter playlists and legs and lungs and hearts that work!
A good run. Before the run, I had a brief wave of anxiety — not for any reason. It just came on all of a sudden — feeling strange, tingly, finding it a littler harder to breathe. Peri-menopause and messed-up hormones, I’ve decided. Running helped, partly because moving always helps and partly because I told myself that I wouldn’t be able to run at a 9:30 pace for so long if something was really wrong with me.
I wasn’t sure how far I’d run this morning, but when I got to the bottom of the franklin hill I had an idea: run until you reach a frozen seep. So I did, which made my run a little longer than usual. What a seep! And falling water from a spring. I thought about crossing the road to get closer to the seep, but there’s no curb and the road isn’t that wide and cars drive faster here then they should, so I didn’t. Instead I took some video from the edge of the trail and then I stood still and marveled at the falling and frozen water, and then the height of the bluff.
frozen seep / weeping spring / 22 jan 2024
After the seep, I ran again until I reached the bottom of the franklin hill, then walked up while I recited ideas for a new poem about the idea of not-seeing. One connection to windows: not seeing a window (or glass) and bumping into it. I’ve read several poems that feature birds who run right into the glass and are dazed. Are there any poems about people? I suppose people mostly (always?) run into glass doors not windows. I’ve done it at least once, while I was studying abroad in Japan. The worst thing about running into glass is the grease smudge your face leaves on the glass. It just stays there, staring at you, embarrassing you — not just because it’s evidence that you ran into the glass, but that your face is greasy.
I’m wondering now: what are the most embarrassing things to not see?
Here’s a poem I found from poem-of-the-day that I’d like to remember.
Leaves that fall. Ought to breed Fire from stone. The world counts On our fall. Our solitude interests The butterflies And the lost gold Of the afternoons.
Ochre and blue walls And the fading peaks Of volcanoes And the sunlight Plummeting beyond The hills waken Leaves to their Lost trees.
To discover You still have A world To make At sunset Sobers The stones.
Love the brevity of this poem and the double-meaning of the first line: leaves from that fall and leaves that fall down. Arequipa is the second largest city in Peru (south of Lima, slightly inland — 100km from the coast).
Back outside! Cold, but much warmer than Tuesday. Low (ish) wind, plenty of sunshine, clear paths. I felt a little tired and sore, but still happy to be outside. Was planning to do my usual routine of running without music, then putting some in at my favorite spot by the falls, but I forgot my headphones. Oh well, if I had been listening to music I might not have heard a goose honking.
10 Things
startled some birds in the brush on the path near the ramp that winds down to the falls bridge — some rustling noises, then a silver flash as the sun caught the feathers on one of the bird’s wings — it reminded me of Eamon Grennan’s line about a lark’s silver trail in Lark-luster or EDickinson’s silver seam in A Bird, came down the Walk
the falls were hidden behind columns of ice
a few people (3 or 4?) walking on the frozen creek, admiring the falls from up close
falling water sound: tinkling, sprinkling, shimmering
the creek was frozen over, with just a few open spots where the water flowed beneath it
running past the stretch of woods near the ford bridge — all the leaves are gone, the small rise up to the bridge fully visible
crunch crunch crunch as my feet struck the ground — not slippery or hard or too soft
my shadow, sharp lines, solid, dark, lamp post shadow, softer, fuzzier
the rhythm of a faster runner’s legs as they passed me — a steady lift lift lift — so graceful
a lone geese honking — not seen, only heard
Somewhere near the Horace Cleveland overlook (near the double bridge), I thought about interiors and exteriors and how you can look in or out of windows and then outside as the abstract/thinking/theorizing/writing and inside as the body. I want to remove the barrier between these, to mix writing with being/doing/moving as a body. Then lines from Maggie Smith’s “Threshold” popped into my head: You want a door you can be on both sides of at once. You want to be on both sides of here and there now and then…Yes, I do.
added 21 jan 2024: Reading through a past entry this morning I suddenly remembered the black capped chickadee calling out their fee bee song so loudly as I ran up the hill between locks and dam no. 1 and the double bridge. Wow! I recall thinking they were in beast mode (a reference to Michael Brecker and how some people describe his playing).
Jane Hirshfield’s Ten Windows, Chapter 6 (Close Reading: Windows)
Many good poems have a kind of window-moment in them–they change their direction of gaze in a way that suddenly opens a broadened landscape of meaning and feeling. Encountering such a moment, the reader breathes in some new infusion, as steeply perceptible as any physical window’s increase of light, scent, sound, or air. The gesture is one of lifting, unlatching, releasing; mind and attention swing open to new-peeled vistas.
windows offer an opening, a broadened landscape, fresh air, a lifting, unlatching, releasing, expansion, an escape or a way into somewhere else
In this chapter, Hirshfield does a close reading of ED’s “We Grow Accustomed to the Dark” — yes!
I have called the third stanza (And so of larger — Darkness –/Those Evenings of the Brain –) the poem’s first window, but for me, the true window in Dickinson’s poem is contained in one word; its quick, penultimate, slipped-in “almost.” (And Life steps almost straight). The effect is so disguised it feels more truly trap-door than window: On this close-to-weightless “almost,” the poem’s assurance stumbles, catches. Its two syllables carry the knowledge that there are events in our lives from which no recovery is possible.
I love Emily Dickinson’s almost in this poem. The space it gives — the possibilities — for living your life otherwise. It seems that Hirshfield reads this almost as unfortunate — you almost made it back to your normal life after the darkness, but not quite. I don’t. There’s so much room (and a lot less pressure) in the almost! So much to write about this idea, so little time right now.
In the chapter, Hirshfield references a “popular” Dickinson poem that I’ve never encountered before:
The Brain — is wider than the Sky — For — put them side by side — The one the other will contain With ease — and You — beside —
The Brain is deeper than the sea — For — hold them — Blue to Blue — The one the other will absorb — As Sponges — Buckets — do —
The Brain is just the weight of God — For — Heft them — Pound for Pound — And they will differ — if they do — As Syllable from Sound —
I’d like to put this into conversation with my mid-run ideas about the body and the mind — maybe add Mary Oliver’s ideas about the difference between a poem and the world from The Leaf and the Cloud too.
bike: 10 minute warm-up run: 3.65 miles basement outside temp: 9 degrees / feels like -4
for future Sara: Tuesday night while sitting in the South High band room, listening to the community jazz band rehearse, I suddenly felt sick — a little like I might faint again, hot and tingling all over, very sensitive to loud sounds. Later on the way home in the ridiculously cold car, I had the chills and felt like I might throw up. Went home and straight to bed. Stayed in bed all the next morning. Not covid (I tested), but maybe the flu?
update, 29 dec 2024: I’m pretty sure that what I experienced was a panic attack. I had another one in May and then went on lexapro.
listening to my Window playlist: I Threw a Brick Through a Window/U2
I feel much better — almost normal — today. I’ve decided that I had the flu and the flu shot I got in November prevented it from being more severe (whew!). Of course this experience gave me some mild anxiety — was I sick, or was the faint-feeling signaling some bigger problem? How long would I be sick? At some point, would I have trouble breathing? Sigh — I dislike how much more I worry these days.
Tip Toe Thru’ the Tulips with Me/Annette Hanshaw
Since I felt pretty good today, I decided to try running on the treadmill. After my feet warmed-up in the cold basement, I felt great. Listened to my winter 2024 playlist and covered the panel displaying the time. I kept telling myself, one more song and I’ll check how much time I have left. When I finally checked, the time was at 31 minutes! Very cool; I thought maybe it would at 21 or 22 minutes. I like playing this game when I’m running on the treadmill; much better than staring down at the display.
Open a New Window/Mame Soundtrack
Noticed my shadow running alongside me. Stared at the water heater straight ahead of me: fuzzy and shifting very slightly. Also, the image had some static.
Look Through Any Window/The Hollies
As I write this, I’m making note of the window songs that are playing. It’s a bit difficult and I feel pressure to hurry up and write something before the next song comes on.
Nan You’re a Window Shopper/Lily Allen
In Nan, You’re a Window Shopper Allen complains — is she complaining or lamenting? — about her nan whose life is so constricted — taking a look, but you never buy/ and mad as fuck/only just alive
Is is no more than an eyehole On the outside scene Making everything –The snow, the runaway dog, The boys brawling and the car Skidding against the tree– Content to be contained Within a reasonable frame? Or could it be
A casement dividing A real Observer from a view Of untrammelled possibility, Its pane connecting A man in a room in Steam heat and a battered chair With his future Which he could not see Were it not there?
Window Shopping/Just Derrick
Perhaps it’s the lens that allows Errant swifts and swallows In a downward swoop Of their tumbling flight To glimpse the man waiting For the future to happen– While he’s caged in time They’re free to look in, And its gift is insight.
Junk/Paul McCartney
I noticed that Hoffman’s next poem is titled, Door. I’ll have to read that one when I study doors!
From Junk:
Buy, buy, says the sign in the shop window Why, why? says the junk in the yard
Bust Your Windows/Jazmine Sullivan
I’ll bust the windows out your car You know I did it ’cause I left my mark Wrote my initials with a crowbar And then I drove off into the dark
Maybe I’ll try experimenting with a themed playlist? I could listen and pick out a few lyrics from each song, then write about them, or turn them into a poem?
4.25 miles minnehaha falls and back 0 degrees / feels like -20
Brr. I really bundled up for this one, even busted out the big guns: toe and finger warmers. They worked!
layers: 2 pairs of black running tights, a green base layer shirt, pink jacket with hood, purple jacket zipped up to my chin, black fleece cap with ear flaps, pink and orange buff covering my mouth, 2 pairs of socks — gray, white — with toe warmers in between them, 1 pair of black gloves, 1 pair of pink/red/green mittens, hand warmers, sunglasses
My forehead felt a little cold at the beginning, but mostly I felt warm enough. My legs started to get sore near the end, which I think was because of the cold: not enough blood to my calf/thigh because it was going to my vital organs — I read that somewhere a few years ago.
10+ Things
a regular! the runner, Santa Claus
the river, frozen — light brown mixed with white, flat
the feebee call of the black-capped chickadee
a few squirrels, scampering
running straight into the sun: my sharp shadow, so sharp I could see the shadow of my breath
one biker — brrr
brittle leaves, scratching on the pavement
a sharp squeak, almost like a little bunny crying out: trees creaking in the wind
the falls, near the ledge: half frozen, sounding like the spray hose on a kitchen sink
the falls, by the overlook: gushing, rushing past the ice, flushing out the bottom
beep beep beep of a truck backing up, sounding flat and smaller than usual
the light rail across Hiawatha rushing by — I wondered how cold the commuters were
almost forgot this one: the wind moving fast through dead leaves on some trees sounded like sizzling heat. I heard it just as the wind was blowing in my face and I felt particularly cold. I imagined it was so cold that it was hot
before my run
I’m in the slow process of reviewing my entries from 2023, a month at a time. Right now, April. On April 18th, I wrote about some ideas from writers/poets that were inspiring my thoughts about an eighth colorblind plate poem on the glitter effect. Paige Lewis and A.R. Ammons and flares and flames and rust. And now I’m thinking about writing one more colorblind plate poem that describes how my own color system works using texture and movement and contrast. It replaces ROYGBIV. Maybe I’ll try and think about it more as I run — when I’m not thinking about how cold I am!
a process note: Rereading all of my entries for the year and summarizing them takes a long time, but it’s worth it. Not only does it offer useful summaries, but going back and reencountering words/ideas/experiences offers new inspiration or old, half-finished projects (like the colorblind plates). And the laborious process of doing this structured task sometimes opens me up to wandering and remembering and imagining that can lead to new words and new ways in.
task: on my run, try to think about motion and texture
during my run
As predicted, I focused mostly on noticing the cold and the wind — such a cold wind in my face! I do remember thinking that the river was flat and stuck, with no sparkle or motion. I thought about contrast with the shadows. Leaves shaking in the wind. Oh — and I thought about how the small things I notice — the little flashes of movement, sound, texture — accumulate into something bigger. This is part of the conversation I started yesterday about flares versus slow burns and whether or not to dazzle. None of the things I notice Dazzle! in a quick burst, but together they add up to something special. After thinking of this idea, I remember Hannah Emerson’s poem, “Peripheral” and the lines:
Direct looking just is too much killing of the moment.
Looking oblique littles the moment into many
helpful moments. Moment moment moment
moment keep in the moment.
after the run
And now, remembering all of these ideas, I’m suddenly thinking of Emily Dickinson’s poem, “Tell all the truth but tell it slant –”
The truth must dazzle gradually Or every man be blind —
Yes, dazzle means to be temporarily blinded by light, or overpowered with light. What does this have to do with what I’m working on right now? Not sure.
And now, back to windows. Here’s a small poem I found the other day that I like. It’s part of a larger series of poems titled, Still Life:
bike: 15 minute warm-up run: 3.7 miles basement outside: -1 degrees, feels like -18
When I checked the weather earlier the feels like temp was -22 and it has to be feels like -20 or warmer for me to go outside for a run. Would I have gone out there if I knew it had warmed up to feels like -18? Possibly. Oh well, the bike and run inside were fine. I listened to a new playlist I created while I ran and didn’t think about much except for my form — swinging my arms, lifting my hips, keeping my shoulders relaxed and my core sturdy.
I looked up and straight ahead at the water heater in front of me. It was fuzzy in the center. As I looked at it, I noticed my shadow — much bigger than me — off to the side.
Okay, now I remember one thing I thought about: the mouse/mice that live in our basement. Would I see one of them flit by? (nope.)
Looking out my window, I just saw someone run by on the sidewalk. So, someone is willing to run in this cold.
Another thought: before I ran I was thinking about a quote from Theodore Roethke that I posted on jan 15, 2020:
Today there’s no time for the mistakes of a long and slow development: dazzle or die.
I wrote about it in an “On this Day: January 15, 2020/2022” page this morning. I was wondering about the value of dazzling in a quick flash versus shimmering with a slow burn. Then these words/ideas popped into my head: flare, flame, a candle burning at both ends, a mushroom erupting and busting through the pavement, moss growing over rocks, fungi nets spreading underground.
I also thought about spending some time on the phrase “slow burn.” Just now I looked it up on Poetry Foundation (search: slow burn) and found a wonderful poem, Over Time by Martha Collins. Here’s one bit of it:
Then gone and then to come: all the time, except the split second, except—
All the time in the world.
And out of this world?
Oh little heart on my wrist, where are we going?
Oh little heart on my wrist! Yesterday I started listening to a podcast with Jenny Odell about her most recent book on time and I decided that when the book was ready (I requested it from the library), I would finally dedicate some time to clocks and time and other forms of time that don’t involve clocks. Very cool!
I’m trying to incorporate some core exercises into my training. I’m 49 and I know if I want to keep running for several more decades, I need to think about (and do something about) things like my core — what did they call it before core became the trend? Abs?
What types of attention/writing/creating experiments can I do with my core exercises? Maybe something connected to the core as center, sturdy, sound, robust, stable, solid, durable.
Here are the core exercises I tried today, most of which came from this post: 12 great core exercises
bent arm plank — 40 seconds
10 push-ups
15 dead bugs (love these)
15 bird dogs
12 supermans
12 Single leg glute bridge
15 In and Outs
15 Runner’s crunch
15 Reverse crunch
Side Planks — 40 seconds on each side
15 Side leg lifts
Am I doing these right, and are they the right exercises to do? We’ll see. If I had access to a pool, I would just swim laps, but I don’t this year.
Here’s the window poem of the day, which I found while listening to my window playlist:
From this height the sunset spans the whole world before me: houses and trees are shadows neon flares between them like sudden fire the freeways run, always strangely vacant with riderless cars empty air
the windows up here refract the blue slate and rose light making the hills on the horizon collide with ideas of Sussex, piedmont or the cold clear wind of the Abruzzi but that is never what is out there.
At home, the lamp curls its aurora into the corners of the room and out the windows squares, rectangles of light stake out a territory on the ragged lawn.
In the center of things between the pressing of the window and air — a small space — there is a meeting that defines nothing, everything.
Love this idea of the small space as meeting defining nothing and everything.
bike: 30 minutes basement run: 1.15 miles outside: 7 degrees / feels like -10
A short run today because I’ve run every day this week so far, and because it’s windy and snowy and cold outside. Watched the first 20 minutes of Jennifer Lawrence’s comedy, No Hard Feelings, while I biked. I like her and I’m finding this movie funny so far. I listened to Taylor Swift’s Reputation while I ran. Tried out my new bright yellow shoes for the first time. I like how they feel and how they look. Quite possibly they will be the shoes I wear when I run the marathon next October. I don’t remember thinking about much as I ran — I focused on my arm swing and staying relaxed and lifting my hips. We turned the treadmill the other way a few months ago so now I won’t see my inverted moon on the dark window anymore. What strange image will replace it? I don’t remember any today. But I’ll have to look for one the next time I run on the treadmill, which will probably be on Monday; it might be arctic hellscape cold then.
architectural prop: By my Window, The Angle of a Landscape
her envelope poems resembled a window with curtains
a magic lens — the warped quality of 19th century windows: the world let loose, nature liquefied — her practice of looking/writing — up and out the window/down at the paper — descriptions as incremental fragments (A Slash of Blue! A Sweep of Gray!)
the window grid creates a pattern — 12 panes — reflected in the formal structure of her poems (degrees, steps, notches, plunges) — each word, line, or stanza is well-defined slot/pane that spotlights an image/emotional state/quality of experience — ’Tis this – invites – appalls – endows – Flits – glimmers – proves – dissolves – Returns – suggests – convicts – enchants Then – flings in Paradise – (Fr 285)
an act of undoing in each pane — nature loosening up (a neat frame in a formless center)
each pane a diagram of rapture
looking through/touching the glass, she connected with the artisans who made it, who left evidence of their labor –warps and striations that were once the artisan’s breath (windows made through glass blowing? wow)
glass blowing and imagery of fiery furnaces, metal flames, boiling, white heat
mid 19th century — glass consciousness
ED’s poems as her own form of glass blowing — creative process of transforming words into poems = making sand into glass into windows
the window grid creates a pattern — 12 panes — reflected in the formal structure of her poems (degrees, steps, notches, plunges) — ’Tis this – invites – appalls – endows – Flits – glimmers – proves – dissolves – Returns – suggests – convicts – enchants Then – flings in Paradise – (Fr 285)
I love this idea of how the windows influenced the form of her writing. Also, the combination of the orderliness/structure of the frame and the unruliness/undoing-ness of her words. It might be fun to use my windows — 2 sets with 2 panes each, a bar in-between the windows, one set in front, one to my right side — as the structure for a few experiments. As I write this, I’m thinking about Victoria Chang’s truck moving across each window frame and Wendell Berry’s black criss-crossed frame.
Here’s a wonderful ED poem that is mentioned in the article:
4 miles almost to franklin and back 15 degrees / feels like 0
Okay winter! A good run even though my legs felt heavy and tired for the first mile. And I was cold — felt it in my lungs. Saw Dave, the Daily Walker, and when he asked, how are you doing?, I replied: I’m cold! To which he said, that’s Minnesota or something like that. The sun was out today and I think I remember admiring my shadow. Heard some strange, almost strangled, noises down in the gorge. Probably honking geese, or maybe a feral kid having fun? Encountered at least one fat tire, a few walkers, no roller skiers. The walking path was covered in slippery snow, but the bike path was almost completely clear. The sky was blue, the trees were empty, the river was? I know I looked at the river, but I don’t remember what color it was or if it had more ice on it.
layers I started in: 2 pairs of black running tights; a bright green tank top; a previously bright green base layer shirt with the sleeves over my thumbs; a purple jacket zipped up to my chin; a pink and orange buff covering my neck and ears; a black cap with fleece lining and ear flaps down; gray socks; raspberry red shoes; 2 pairs of gloves — inner ones were black, outer bright pink with white stripes.
layers I ended in: 2 pairs of black running tights; a bright green tank top; a previously bright green base layer shirt pushed up on my arms a little; a purple jacket unzipped a few inches; a pink and orange buff around my neck; a black cap with fleece lining and ear flaps up; gray socks; raspberry red shoes; 1 pair of black gloves — the bright pink ones were in my pocket.
Listened to my breathing, cars, geese as I ran north. Put in my new “Windows” playlist (see below) on the way back south.
Sometimes you took the shape of an unseen mosquito, sometimes of illness.
Presumed most of the time to be passing, yet importunate as a toddler who demanded her own way, as a phone that would not stop ringing long after it should.
Unignorable pavement slap of the gone-flat tire.
All afternoon the thunder was interrupted by sunshine. All night the rain was interrupted by trees and roofs.
And still, as rusting steel is uninterrupted by dryness and hunger uninterrupted by sleep, interruption and non-interruption sat in the day’s container as salt sits in milk, one whiteness disguised by another.
As a fish in a tank is interrupted by glass, and turns, a person’s fate is to continuedespite, until.
Death: an interruption not passing, weighing one hundred and fifty-eight pounds, carried on cut plywood with yellow straps.
Birth: an interruption between two windows, trying to think of any joke, any tune, that is new.
Between them:
this navigation by echolocation and lidar, the weathers of avalanche, earthquake, tsunami, firestorm, drought; a moment that sets down—gently, sleepily—its half-read novel on a bedside table whose side turned toward the wall stays unpainted, confident the story will be there again come morning.
definition of an assay
Assays began with a poem written after I’d reread Edgar Allan Poe’s stories while writing an essay on how hiddenness works in poems. Some of the qualities of essay exploration and prose step lingered in its music and mode of thinking. At the time, I was regularly seeing the journal Science. On the back would often be advertisements for half-million-dollar machines for performing assays. That word—close to essay and sharing its root in the idea of an attempt, a try—refers to discovering a thing’s nature by breaking it into its elemental parts. The poem became ‘Poe: An Assay.’ That approach to writing, of testing a subject for its discoverable parts, imaginative and factual, caught. I began writing others. ‘Judgment: An Assay.’ ‘Tears: An Assay.’ ‘And: An Assay.'”
assay (def): the testing of a metal or ore to determine its ingredients and quality
my own interruption
Sitting at my desk, in front of my window, half-listening to the latest Foo Fighter album, an interruption — lyrics: there is something between us/I see right through/waiting on the other side of the glass. A window interrupting me! It’s strange how interruptions work. I’ve written/taught/spoke about the learning to let the world interrupt you. Maybe it’s not about letting the world interrupt you — it will do that anyway — but being open to that interruption, letting it in — opening the window to it?
a few more random window references that recently interrupted me:
She Came in Through the Bathroom Window/ The Beatles
My Own Worst Enemy/ Lit — came in through the window last night (thanks Scott)
With all three of these examples, I’m thinking about the window and how it’s not a door. And in The Beatles and Lit examples there’s something not-quite-right, not normal, unacceptable about entering through the window. Using the window instead of the door is another way of saying something about your life is fucked up.
unrelated to these other examples, the scene of the window in The Amityville Horror– 1979 (iykyk) — I still think about that window falling on the kid’s hand sometimes. I’m not sure I’ve seen the whole movie — maybe I watched this bit on HBO and was too freaked out to watch the rest?
window pain!
Okay, now I want to make a window playlist to listen to as I think more about windows! (after the run): I did, and I listened to the first
Window/Fiona Apple Window/Genesis Window/Mountain Man Smokin Out the Window/Silk Sonic Keep Passing the Open Windows/Queen Lookin’ Through the Windows/Jackson 5