52 in the afternoon is not warm enough for spring, but it was fine for my run. Sunny, still, beautiful shadows. All over the sidewalk: little explosions of shadow buds on the tips of branches. While on the upper trail I listened to my “Sight Songs” playlist, when I went below I listened to voices floating above, rustling below, and the warning cries of black-capped chickadees.
I took the lower trail through the oak savanna, past the ravine, up the gravel trail to the ancient boulder, down to the tunnel of trees, then down the old stone steps to the river.
10 Things
rustling below — an animal, maybe a turkey? No, a human in a bright red jacket
ruts and cracks all over the few parts of the lower trail that are paved
green exploding everywhere, new leafs on a tree, pushing through the slats of the wrought iron fence
voices of kids, playing at the school playground
blue water
tree shadows, some sprawling, some exploding
a new layer of gravel
ran through a small cloud of gnats and trapped at least two in my eye juice — yuck!
very soft and deep sand on the small trail winding through the floodplain forest
loose gravel on the hill out of the ravine, making it more challenging to run
more holes
Still playing around with how to visualize the different hole poems and how to introduce/present the different elements: word, line/string/thread, hole. A wild idea last night that I can barely imagine executing. For a poem in which I have a double grid — one grid drawn directly over the poem, another created out of thread elevated above it — I would use needles instead of pins for stringing the thread. Yes, this is ridiculous — if I’m doing the math right, that would be 84 needles to thread, which I will never have enough spoons for. But wait — what if I put 2 needles on the center dot and used pins for the perimeter? How would this look? I’ve been thinking of the needle as eye ever since I used the phrase, threading the eye of a needle. Hmm, that idea needs to simmer some more.
This morning, I returned to Holes 1 and thought about how to find the words on the pages of the New Yorker essay. This poem was the start of this w/hole journey, so I imagine it as an introduction to the series and to the key elements — in particular: hole = blind spot and line/string = lines of amsler grid. Sara this second has decided on this plan: a grid with my blind spot on it for each panel, drawn over the words of the poem / the words printed out on other paper, then cut out and pasted on top of the grid, each numbered / an additional grid with blindspot/hole drawn at bottom as key/for explanation. Here’s the first stage:
Holes 1 / phase 1 (7 may)
an hour or two later . . . Next, I drew on an Amsler Grid then glued on a caption and the title of the poem. I still need to draw the hole in my vision directly on the grid. This will require scaling the hole down. I’m thinking of trying out the Chuck Close grid method on another amsler then cutting it out and tracing it on the “real” one. That’s post-run Sara’s job.
holes 2 : phase 2, 7 may
I like it! I was able to (very) roughly approximate my hole to fit in the smaller grid, but I won’t post it here until it has been published somewhere.
Sunny, cool-ish. Overdressed in tights and my hooded pullover. Everywhere green and gorgeous. I was too dazzled by the green to notice the river. Was it sparkling? I also didn’t notice the falls — how hard and fast were they falling? I do remember giving a quick glance to the creek: gray, open, flowing fast.
When I wasn’t thinking about anything, which was much of the time, I thought about not running too fast and pushing through tough moments
10 Things
a class-sized group of kids down in the oak savanna — running above, I heard their voices, then saw them hiking below the mesa on the winchell trail
passing a guy on veterans bridge — I was about the say hi when I noticed he was talking into a phone
the surrey kiosk is up — today, on a wednesday, it was empty and closed
running down the locks and dam hill, passing a man, exchanging greetings — hello / hi
encountering a series of bikers — spaced far enough apart that I wondered if they were together — the first two had bright headlights on
from behind, the faint noise of bike wheels moving very slowly, finally passing — a woman very upright in a bright yellow jacket biking very casually
explosions of white blossoms on some of the trees lining the trail
a mower at wabun, the smell of freshly cut grass
the parking lot at veterans home was crowded and full
a moment: running just north of the 44th street parking lot — shadows then suddenly more light: a net or web of shadows, some sprawled, some with little circles at the tips (the buds of trees)
When I saw these shadows I stopped running, pulled out my phone, and took a few pictures. A thought: this net of shadows would be the grid/net obscuring the text of a NYer essay. I’ll have to play around with it. As I kept running, I thought about shadowboxes and silhouettes and playing around with them in a visual poem. I stopped twice more to take shadowed pictures.
12345678910
I decided to post all the pictures that I took so I could study them some more. I like imagining these shadows as a net or a veil, a weaving/gathering of threads/strings/lines that affect my view of what is beneath them. Here it is the sidewalk, on the NYer page, it’s the words.
a thought: I’ve been trying to create neat and precise (well, precise-ish) grids of lines to mimic the Amsler grid, but does that really express/show how I see, or how I feel about, the words as I try to read them? What if I drew a “normal” grid directly on the text and then made the grid elevated above it more slanted, askew, not straight or orderly?
a few hours later: I made another frame out of cardboard and then tried to turn it into a loom that I could thread a grid on. Unsuccessful. Too hard to cut the slats enough so I could wind thread through it. I’m not completely giving up on this idea, but I think I’ll take a break from it. A little discouraging, but that’s okay. I think I just need some time to build up the skills to figure it out.
4.2 miles shadow falls / monument and back 50 degrees
The earliest run I’ve done in some time. I started just after 8, which would have been a late run five years ago. I want to get back to early morning runs as it gets warmer. Even in 50 degrees, I was sweating. Is it the effort of hot flashes?
I decided to run through the neighbor hood, and past the Church daycare. The kids were outside already and having fun. It sounded like one kid was playing some sort of game where he was blasting his enemies as he ran near the perimeter of the fence — take that! pew pew pew! I admired the river as I ran over the lake street bridge. Blue, calm, inviting reflections. No rowers yet. At the Monument, I could hear Shadow Falls roaring, which only happens after rain, so I stepped off the trail and hiked for a closer look. A runner with a dog passed me at one point, both of them having no problems navigating the narrow and steep trail on the edge of the bluff — good morning! thank you! /hi! sure! I couldn’t see the falls falling but I heard the gentle rushing of water. In a flash, I thought of the poem I wrote last year, especially this part:
Deep in the autumn when rain rarely happens and nothing flows down off the ledge, listen for something other than water, listen for shadows instead.
Shadows of soldiers, Shadows of mothers, Shadows of paved-over creeks. Shadows that signal what else could be here now Shadows that dwell in-between.
Speaking of shadows, I saw mine, down in the ravine, beside me on the path, climbing a tree.
In addition to the runner and the dog, there was another hiker on the trail, and a few different pairs of fast runners near the hill that climbs out of the monument park. I heard the roar of a plane, then saw the flash of silver in the sky. Also heard cheeseburger cheeseburger — I think that’s a carolina wren? Yes! Looking it up, the results said it was a black capped chickadee, but I knew it wasn’t. I found the carolina wren when I remembered the other words people think this song sounds like: tea kettle tea kettle.
This run wasn’t easy — sore legs, unfinished business — but I’m glad I did it. I love being outside in the early-ish morning. Today it was 8, but I’d like to be up and out by 6:30 or 7 this summer.
With summer, and high humidity coming, here’s a poem to help me endure it:
What am I if not what happens when I try to run away?
Water falls out of me like an opinion. I’m like a screen door banging between two rivers.
Dear air, what’s inside me you’re so desperate to take?
I put on the Atlantic like a sweater. My head bobs on the surface of a lake I’m named after.
Where do I belong? My head asks. My body, exasperated, answers.
hike: 60 minutes minnehaha off leash dog park with FWA and Delia 63 degrees
Ahhh! A wonderful late morning for a hike. The green continues to creep up the trees. More exploding shadows of new buds. I only recall hearing one dog name: Liza. Liza, don’t you ambush that dog! That dog was Delia, and if there was any ambushing being done, it was by Delia to Liza and her human. Delia loves to get other dogs worked up, which the humans don’t see, or ignore. They assume because Delia is small and cute she is always the one being preyed upon. Ha! Another typical Delia dog encounter: a big talk playing fetch in the water. Delia thought it looked fun and wanted to join in. The big dog barked at her, which seem to translate to: back off! this is my game, and this is my stick!
Often as we’re walking, FWA and I talk about video games or the past or One Piece. Today we wer’re mostly quiet, except for my occasional commentary on this tree or that leaf. I was fine not talking; I liked having the chance to listen to all the different sounds: birds, footsteps, a nearby stream rushing or gushing or swirling in an eddy.
holes
Today, more cutting out black netting holes and layering and mapping them on the paper. For now, I’m pinning them, but I’m wondering if I could fasten them with a button through the center and then glue the word to the button? Would that work on paper? Only one way to find out — I just need more buttons and a needle!
Here’s one version of Holes 1. I wrote numbers directly on the page to indicate how to read it, but I’m not sure if I want to keep them. Also, I kept the cross-hatched hole and the pencil shaded one for now.
the numbered version
another note: the shape of the word is the shape of my working central vision. In theory, I like doing this, but I think the shape looks awkward. I’d prefer a circle instead.
the hole process island where reading still possible waits as large something that surrounds it grows
another note: I want to make the shade part around the hole process larger also: instead of individual numbers, I could number the 4 pages/panels and identify the location of the words in a small key
word island where reading still possible waits as large something that surrounds it grows
After 4 days in Chicago visiting my sister, a great run. A wonderful trip and a wonderful return. I felt relaxed and strong and steady. Ran for 45 minutes without stopping. A big mental victory. And I didn’t feel wiped out at the end — a big physical victory. I kept my splits steady instead of speeding up too much in the second and third mile. I think that helped. I should be mindful of the second and third mile in future runs.
I ran south and then, instead of continuing on to the falls, I ran up the wabun hill and by the veterans’ home first. Then over the bridge, through the park, past the falls and up and out of the park. I almost always stop at my favorite viewing spot, but didn’t today. Hooray for mental strength!
10 Things
click clack — roller skiers behind me as I neared the locks and dam no 1
overheard — one roller skier to the other: hey — do you want to go to the falls and then turn around? another skier: sure!
open view: above the oak savanna, near the spot where the hills split and you can see the river
empty benches
the rumble of a jack hammer
a cacophony of chirping birds in the trees between the veterans’ bridge and the falls — such a convention!
the creek was brown and subdued
the falls were flowing, but thinner
on the cobblestones beside the falls: a small stretch of ice
waved to a regular: Santa Claus!
before and after the run
Before the run, I was thinking about chants and remembered the performance of a poem I had seen in the movie, Poetry in Motion. I looked it up: The Cutting Prow: For Henri Matisse/ Ed Sanders. What I had remembered, and wanted to hear again as inspiration was the chanting,
I’ve been thinking that my rock, river, and air chants should do something like this: repeating the essence/the form of something through the chanting of a few significant words. As I ran, I might have briefly thought about this chant/these ideas/this poem, but not in ways that I can recall now.
After the run, I watched Sanders’ full performance of the poem again and found it online:
“The genius was 81 Fearful of blindness Caught in a wheelchair Staring at death
But the Angel of mercy Gave him a year To scissor some shapes To soothe the scythe
And shriek! shriek! Became swawk! swawk! The peace of Scissors.
There was something besides The inexpressible
Thrill
Of cutting a beautiful shape—- For
Each thing had a ‘sign’ Each thing had a ‘symbol’ Each thing had a cutting form
-swawk swawkk___ to scissor seize.
‘One must study an object a long time,’ the genius said, ‘to know what its sign is.’
The scissors were his scepter The cutting Was as the prow of a barque To sail him away. There’s a photograph which shows him sitting in his wheelchair bare foot touching the floor drawing the crisscross steel a shape in the gouache
His helper sits near him Till he hands her the form To pin to the wall
He points with a stick How he wants it adjusted This way and that, Minutitudinous
The last blue iris blooms at The top of its stalk Scissors/scepter Cutting prow
(sung)
Ah, keep those scissors flashing in the World of Forms, Henri Matisse
The cutting of the scissors Was the prow of a boat To take him away The last blue iris Blooms at the top On a warm spring day
Ah, keep those scissors flashing In the World of Forms, Henri Matisse
Sitting in a wheelchair Bare feet touching the floor Angel of Mercy Pushed him over Next to Plato’s door
When I first heard/saw this a few years ago, I was drawn to the sound of the scissors and the words he repeated, but now I’m also thinking about Matisse and the cutting forms. Very cool. I might have to return to shadows, silhouettes, and forms and look into Matisse some more!
an hour, or so, later: Watching Poetry in Motion from the beginning, I encountered this great bit during the opening credits:
You don’t want to lead anyone in any subjective sense, to push anything onto them, you know. I mean, you could say teach in a certain way but it’s like putting light in people’s eyes, you know. Just opening the door but not showing them around and telling them, this is the chair, this is table, but saying, here’s the room and turning on the light.
4 miles river road, north/south 50 degrees wind: 14 mph / gusts: 29 mph
Ooo. Felt that wind, running north. A few times, I had to square my shoulders and sink down to face it, like I was a linebacker getting ready to tackle the air. Bright sun, lots of shadows — of tree branches, and fence posts, and flying birds, and swirling leaves. I don’t remember looking at the river as much as I remember admiring the air above it. Such openness! I felt strong until I didn’t. Stopped to walk a few times. Took some wooden steps down on a very steep part of the winchell trail. No wall or fence to stop you from falling far enough down to break something. Stopped at the sliding bench to see how much green was left and to admire the birds flitting from branch to branch.
Also stopped after mile 1, to record myself fitting some of Lorine Niedecker’s words into my running/breathing rhythm:
In every part of every thing stuff that once was rock.
Except, I forgot the stuff part, so I ended up with this:
In every part of every thing there once was living rock.
Does this second one make sense? Not sure.
before the run
Riprap. Thinking about riprap and rock and creating some sort of ceremony related to the gorge and running on and above the absence of rock. Reading Mary Oliver’s section in The Leaf and the Cloud, titled Riprap, fitting it into my breathing/running pattern —
tell me dear Rock — will secrets fly out when I break open?
Raking leaves and hearing the man next door scream at his grown daughter again through walls that aren’t thin, listening as she screams back, wondering what the daycare kids will remember from this moment.
before we are all wiped off of this planet that desperately wants us to live of natural causes, like kindness, like caring
Remembering something else I read earlier about a troubled woman who encountered a stranger that offered her kindness instead of judgment:
“The only question she asked me was, ‘Where do you want to go?'” Stacia said. “No judgment, no expectations. Just acceptance.”
Stacia immediately felt relieved.
She didn’t want to talk about her troubles; she just wanted to go home. She got in the car and they talked about things that gave her a sense of calm: nature, music and art.
After about 40 minutes, the woman dropped Stacia off at her house. Stacia didn’t learn the stranger’s name and she never saw her again. But she has never forgotten the woman’s question or how it made her feel.
“What I experienced that day — a single generous act of compassion — has stayed with me ever since and it shaped the life I went on to live.”
a few minutes later: Watching the daycare kids playing in the leaves in the front yard, screaming in delight. Remembering how one of them greeted my daughter last week as she parked in front of our house, distraught and overwhelmed, with: you’re beautiful, and how that kindness offered made such a difference.
Reading Gary Snyder’s poem, “Riprap,” fitting his words into my breathing pattern:
Lay down these words be- fore your mind like rocks placed solid by hands in choice of place, set before the body of the mind in time and in space.
Riprap: being broken up, made tender, feelings/fears exposed and scattered, gathering them into words and building a new foundation.
Make it into a triptych: 1. the original poem (rock), 2. the new poem composed of words from the old — words reordered (riprap), 3. the faint trace of the original poem with the words from the new poem in their original order
And a palimpsest idea: take one of the poems, and show the different layers or iterations of it over the years, from 2021 to now
4.5 miles monument and back 60 degrees humidity: 93%
A mist hanging above the river. A heavy white sky. It looked very cool, but felt too humid. Heavy legs. Not a great run, but still wonderful to be moving through the mist. Noticed more leaves changing, mostly yellow. Heard water falling in the Summit ravine: Shadow Falls. I imagined that it was not water falling, but shadows. Then I thought about myself shedding shadows as I ran. A cool image.
On the lake street bridge heading west, 2 more memoriable images.
First, a single shell on the river, rowing towards the mist. The rower in a bright yellow shirt. I couldn’t hear the paddles, but saw them gliding through the water.
Second, looking down at the shadow of the bridge: dark with a quivering edge. I thought about how all edges I see are often moving like this. The moving edge of the bridge is because of wind on water. The moving edges for me are because of dying cone cells.
bridge shadow, moving edge
Recited some of the chants I’ve been working on:
girl ghost gorge soft slow sight
saint peter saint peter saint peter sandstone glenwood glenwood glenwood forMAtion plateville platteville plateville limeston glac ial till glac ial till
In the late afternoon, Scott and I went to the lake. He was planning to take a walk, I was going to swim. I even brought my wetsuit. But, when I went down to the water, I immediately knew it wasn’t going to happen. The water lapping the shore was bright green and the water beyond it looked like green paint. Blue-green algae blooms. Maybe the blue-green algae was only in this spot, but probably it wasn’t. I decided it wasn’t worth the risk. So I took off my wetsuit and went for a walk with Scott instead.
run: 4 miles the monument and back 73 degrees dew point: 69
Thought about going out for a run around 6:30 am but watched Pogacar defend his yellow jersey in the alps instead. Excellent. Finally made it out for a run at 10:30. Not as bad as yesterday, but too warm, especially in the direct sun.
Chanted in triple berries. Admired the reflections of clouds on the river. Heard the kids on the playground at the church preschool. Put in the soundtrack to “Operation Mincemeat” for the second half.
I thought briefly about fields — visual and of tall grass and open vistas — and buoys and dots and simple forms.
Walking home after the run, I noticed someone stopped on the corner with a dog. I wondered why they were stopped — was there a car coming? should I not cross? Got to the other side and realized that it was my son, FWA, and our dog, Delia. It’s happened before — just last week — but it’s always upsetting when I don’t recognize my kids or my husband or my dog. For a moment, they’re only strangers.
Crossing back over the lake street bridge, I took a few pictures of the clouds reflected on the river:
clouds reflected on riverriver clouds
note: I had to crop out my finger from the left hand corner. Even with the cropping, I think these are cool pictures.
visual fields, landscapes, meadows
1
At the end of yesterday’s entry I wondered what sighting buoys and swimming in the lake had to do with the visual field test. I’m still thinking about it. On a literal level, the way I’ve trained myself to sight a buoy, lining up its path, then trusting myself to swim straight to it even when I can’t see it, is how I took the visual field test last month: I fixed on the center dot and looked straight at it, or where I knew it to be when I couldn’t see it. My eyes didn’t wander. Another connection: at a distance, the buoy doesn’t look like the shape that it is — a triangle — it looks like a small dot in the center of my vision.
2
Yesterday, reviewing early july entries, I encountered this definition of visual field: “that portion of space in which objects are visible at the same moment during steady fixation of the gaze in one direction.”
It reminded me of definitions of landscape I came across yesterday in the OED: “A view or prospect of natural inland scenery, such as can be taken in at a glance from one point of view.”
the space in which objects are visible at the same time, what all can be taken in (simultaneously) with one glance
3
as though there swung at the end of a tunnel, a passage dotted with endless points of arrival, as though our gaze started just outside our faces and corkscrewed its way toward the horizon, processual, as if looking took time to happen and weren’t instantaneous, offered whole in one gesture before we ask, before our will, as if the far Sonoma mountains weren’t equally ready to be beheld as the dead fly on the sill) (Pastoral/ Forrest Gander)
What I remember of better eyesight is how the world assembled all at once, an effortless gestalt—the light, the distance, the dappled detail of shade, exact crinkles of a facial expression through a car windshield, the lift of a single finger from a steering wheel, sunlight bouncing off a waxed hood. (Naomi Cohn)
4
A quick glance — my eyes emerge from the water like an alligator to look ahead for the buoy. Often all I see is a green mass of trees and empty water. Occasionally, a bright dot, far off. I don’t see it every time I look, but enough times to keep steadily swimming towards it. No time to think, not enough data to be certain, but I believe it’s the buoy, and usually I’m right. A few times I’ve mistaken a bright swim cap or a car’s headlight or a sailboat for the buoy.
5
“A field is used more often to describe an area managed by people. The field before you was once an orchard and pasture belonging to a farmer. A meadow is used to describe a wild area.”
“Fields and meadows start when trees have been removed from an area. This can occur naturally with a forest fire or flood, or humans may cut down a forest. Seeds from grasses and weeds take root shortly after and a meadow is born.
As the trees within my macula disappear, my forest meadows. here I’m thinking about my classic memory from science class with the inverted tree in the back of the eye.
bike: 8 miles lake nokomis and back 82 degrees / 79 degrees
Biked to the lake! No worries, felt relaxed and able to see well enough, or if I couldn’t see, able to navigate well enough. No moments of panic. Biking back was the best. Long shadows, cooler, people biking/walking/running and enjoying the calm evening. I admired the shadow of me on a bike, looking larger than life.
swim: 3 loops lake nokomis open swim 82 degrees
Yesterday, open swim sent out a warning about blue-green algae. They weren’t closing the lake, just encouraging people to be cautious. I didn’t see any algae blooms, although I noticed that the water was a more vivid, electric green. The water was warm and calm and wonderful. With the sun, it was difficult to see — I could see dots, which I trusted were buoys as I swam towards the little beach, but swimming back towards the big beach, barely anything other than bright sun, sparkling water. I managed to see the buoys at least once and trusted my shoulders to guide me across. I don’t think I’ll ever not be amazed that this works, that I swim straight to the buoys when I can’t (or barely can) see them.
I tried something new as a I swam. Each time I tilted my head to breathe, I thought a word, usually 1 syllable but occasionally 2: squish flash flit fly flush flare zip zap bird tree cloud blue girl ghost gorge life death bliss breath bubbles bike run float lift shut jump black red orange feet toe hand face field grass give take spirit sprite light dark
There were many other words, but I don’t remember them all. I might try this again. Maybe some great words/images will burst out?!
images collected in consciousness like a tree alone on the horizon (Crows/ Marilyn Nelson)
Felt like summer today. Hot! A common refrain: I need to get up earlier and get out there before it gets too warm! Difficult. I can tell that the 2+ week break got me out of cardio shape. My heart rate got higher faster. I’m sure the heat had something to do with it too. After a mile, I decided to switch from 9/1 to walking every time my heart rate went above 170, then running again when it went down to 135. A did a lot of walking.
At first, I listened to the traffic and the kids at the church daycare and my feet, but after a few miles, I put in my shadows playlist — if I could find the shadows on the path, I’d find them in the music!
From the Franklin bridge the river was beautiful — so many sparkles. I noticed a few sandbars just below the surface. No rowers. They were probably here earlier in the morning — another reason to get up and run early!
I smelled the flowers — a hint of Big Red cinnamon gum. Heard the birds and construction trucks backing up. Gave attention to the grass, filled with clover and dandelions. At the end, nearing the corner of my block, I watched the shadows of leaves dancing on the grass and dirt — a big patch that was more dirt than grass. Ants? We have several of those in our backyard.
As I looked at the grass and thought about the blade and the sheath, I remembered/realized something: I can’t really see individual grass. Not enough cone cells for that. I write really because I can sometimes see an individual leaf, but just barely, and more the idea that there’s a blade, but definitely not the sheath.
I forgot to post this earlier: I stopped at the sliding bench, noticed how much green there was, and decided to take a picture in order to compare it to a pre-green picture:
sliding bench / may 2025sliding bench / dec 2024
grass roots and astroturfing
Looking through my Plague Notebook, Vol 25 notes from yesterday, I saw this: grass roots — origins of the phrase. So, I looked it up and found this on wikipedia:
A grassroots movement is one that uses the people in a given district, region or community as the basis for a political or continent movement. Grassroots movements and organizations use collective action from volunteers at the local level to implement change at the local, regional, national, or international levels. Grassroots movements are associated with bottom-up, rather than top-down decision-making, and are sometimes considered more natural or spontaneous than more traditional power structures. * The earliest origins of “grass roots” as a political metaphor are obscure. In the United States, an early use of the phrase “grassroots and boots” was thought to have been coined by Senator Albert Jeremiah Beveridge of Indiana, who said of the Progressive Party in 1912, “This party has come from the grass roots. It has grown from the soil of people’s hard necessities”.
In the entry, it also mentioned astroturfing, which is an organization that presents itself as grassroots, but is really lead by an outside organization/corporation.
Astroturf — I wanted to find the origins of this term:
The synthetic grass product that eventually became known as AstroTurf® was originally designed as an urban playing surface meant to replace the concrete and brick that covered the recreation areas in city schoolyards. During the Korean War, the U.S. Army had found urban recruits to be less physically fit than rural recruits. Attributing this to lack of green space in cities, the Ford Foundation funded research for Monsanto to create a synthetic grass replica in 1962. It had to be wear-resistant, cost efficient, comfortably cushioned, and traction tested. Two years later employees of the Chemstrand Company, a subsidiary of Monsanto Industries, developed a synthetic surface called ChemGrass and installed it at the Moses Brown School, a private educational facility in Providence, Rhode Island.
More excellent running weather. Sunny and calm and warm(er). Birds singing and swooping and perching on tree branches right in front of me. I felt relaxed and strong and my back only hurt once, when I stood up after re-tying my shoe. I ran without stopping to walk to the bottom of the hill and right next to the river. It was swirling foam on the edges. Ran back up to under the franklin bridge then stopped to walk the rest of the hill. I noticed a sign — Trail closed starting March 31st — uh oh. Just looked it up; it’s only for 2 weeks:
Bike and walk trails along West River Parkway will close between the I-94 Bridge and Franklin Avenue for up to two weeks beginning Monday, March 31, 2025.
The closure is necessary for contractors hired by the Minnesota Department of Transportation to install a safe span system that will protect trail users during repairs to the bridge this year.
Trail users will be detoured to the upper West River Parkway roadway between the I-94 Bridge and Franklin Avenue. This same closure will be repeated in August so that workers can remove the safe span system after repairs are complete.
Listened to a mood playlist: energy for the rest of the run. The best (or worst?) song on the playlist was “Hocus Pocus” by Focus. I love the song, but it was too fast to try and run to!I had to increase my cadence to 200 bpm to match it! The song also does not have a steady rhythm; it just keeps getting faster and faster, probably because they were on cocaine while they recorded it.
10 Things
the water was a brownish greenish blue
in the flats I leaned over the ledge and watched the swirling foam slowly travel down stream
workers on the road above the tunnel of trees, doing something to sewer which released a sour smell
the workers were wearing bright yellow vests
passed a walker who refused to move over — they were walking right next to the line. I suddenly wondered, are they neuro-divergent? then, maybe I should chill out about people needing to follow the accepted rules about where and how to walk on the trail
stopped at the sliding bench, 1: heard a cardinal — it was somewhere nearby — looked up and saw that it was on a branch close to me. Was it red? I couldn’t tell, but I did noticed how its tail quivered slightly all the time — I’m assuming it was keeping its balance. Do birds have to constantly adjust while perched?
stopped by the sliding bench, 2: looking down at the white sands beach, hoping for movement. Yes, there, deep in — a walker moving through the trees
the small shadow of a bird crossing my path, flying fast!
my sharp shadow in front of me, crossing over the softer shadows of tree branches
the shadow of a tree with dead leaves on it — looking almost like a messed-up pom pom
At the end of the run, as I was walking home, I had a thought about CA Conrad’s and their idea of the “extreme present,” which I wrote about on here earlier this month on march 5th:
“extreme present” where the many facets of what is around me wherever I am can come together through a sharper lens.
Conrad creates their soma(tic) rituals to make being anything but present is nearly impossible. Running by the gorge can put/force me into the extreme present. This sense of the extreme present doesn’t happen for the entire run, but I can achieve it in moments. In their lengthy, day-long rituals — wear a red wig, eat only red food — is Conrad able to achieve this extreme present for longer?
birdsong!
This morning Scott heard the cardinals outside his window and because he wanted to use some birdsong in his latest music project, he placed his phone on a chair on the deck and recorded some. I liked how he described it: I left the phone out on the deck then returned inside and went quietly about my business. When he told me about how similar each wave of sound looked, I asked if he could screen shot it and send me the sound file so I could post it here:
cardinal song, an image of sound wavescardinal song / 26 march 2025
Wow! So uniform.
Happy 151st Birthday Robert Frost!
When the poem of the day on poetry foundation was a Robert Frost one, I figured it must be his birthday. Yep — 26 march 1874.
Always wrong to the light, so never seeing Deeper down in the well than where the water Gives me back in a shining surface picture Me myself in the summer heaven godlike Looking out of a wreath of fern and cloud puffs. Once, when trying with chin against a well-curb, I discerned, as I thought, beyond the picture, Through the picture, a something white, uncertain, Something more of the depths—and then I lost it. Water came to rebuke the too clear water. One drop fell from a fern, and lo, a ripple Shook whatever it was lay there at bottom, Blurred it, blotted it out. What was that whiteness? Truth? A pebble of quartz? For once, then, something.
A beautiful sonnet — 14 lines, 11 beats per line, almost iambic pentameter. Is that right? I always struggle to hear meter properly.
Love the description of a reflection: Me myself in the summer heaven godlike/Looking out of a wreath of fern and cloud puffs
And that something white, uncertain, seen briefly then lost to a ripple. Yesterday I posted some lyrics from “The Windmills of Your Mind” about the ripples from a pebble. Ripple is a great word.
Seeing this sonnet is making me think I should try that form for my color poems. I could study a few different ways of doing the sonnet — Diane Seuss, Terence Hayes, William Shakespeare. Any others?
oh orchid o’clock
A good morning on the poetry sites. Not only did I find Robert Frost’s poem, but I found a cool collection that fits in with my study of time: Oh Orchid O’Clock by Endi Bogue Hartigan. (note: I just emailed Moon Palace Books about ordering it! update: I ordered it!)
/it is the president’s turned up o’clock it is America’s deadliness and dailiness
o’clock / it is glued to the headline o’clock
it is lunchhour-beeline o’clock / it is it’s only Tuesday o’clock another
curbside memorial o’clock another caterpillar miracle o’clock another
people emptying from their lives o’clock or into
their lives o’clock the Nile floods the Nile floods every hotspell in this week
I discovered this book through poems.com, which had one of its poems posted today:
I fall asleep with the rain sound app of my cellphone, the app includes distant thunderclap sounds and there are people who recorded or simulated these sounds, and it is time to disagree and thank the dawn. I disagree with this rain, I feel absurd for thesimulation of it and yet my brain waves have come to depend on it, depend onsimulated porous points between the raindrops. Always the porous dream, always theneural authority, the reaction meme, always the authority of always, the puncture ofalways, time spent saying always, the spider legs of always, the sleep command, thewake spindles, the spider leg threatening to break from the spider.
So cool! Encountering Hartigan’s work, I was inspired to think about time in relation to my blind spot and the practice of running beside the gorge that has happened beside (and because of?) my vision loss. I wrote the following in my Plague Notebook:
my blind spot breaks open seconds pries apart the hard edges of a beat invites me to dwell inside
I am suspended between beats as time slows but never stops with moves so slight it takes a practiced eye to see their soft shimmering embrace what is not seen but felt — wind the rotation of the earth a bench sliding into the gorge rock crumbling cone cells collapsing a blind spot expanding
What a great afternoon walk with Delia the dog! No coat. No mud. Walked to the Winchell Trail then down beside the chain link fence. Drip Drip Drip — the sewer pipe in the ravine. Everything washed out — light brown, tan, yellowed. Up on the mesa in the savanna, a great view of the river. Was able to walk on the dirt path between the savanna and the 38th street stairs. They’ve put down some mulch, so it’s not as muddy. As I neared the entrance to the Winchell Trail, I passed the spot where I fell in the mud, straight on my tailbone. No mud now, only memories and a still-sore back.
On the way to the river, I noticed something interesting hidden on the tree trunk while Delia sniffed around. I took a picture of it:
= > ÷
When I was looking at it in person, I thought someone had carved the message in the tree, but studying it now, it looks like it’s a rock wedged in a crack. I probably should have taken another picture that wasn’t quite as close-up for scale. That is one tiny rock.
I had to look up how to type the division sign on a mac. Hold down option and /
