Tag: zombies

oct 3/RUN

5 miles
bottom franklin hill and back
50 degrees / humidity: 75%

In 4 days, I’ll be running the marathon! Today’s run was mostly fine; my left hip was a little tight, but I think it will be okay. Otherwise I was relaxed. It was cool, but humid, so I sweat a lot. For several of the miles I chanted in triple berries: strawberry / blueberry / raspberry. For the last mile, I put on my metronome, set to 175, and synched up my feet. So cool! When I lock in with the center of the beat, I know it. I become the beat, or my feet become the sound of the beat. I feel a soft buzz throughout my legs that spreads to the back of my head. I am running without effort — not floating, but bouncing off the ground. I wasn’t locked in the whole time. Sometimes I was ahead of it or behind because I got distracted by another runner, but when I locked in again, bzzzzzzz. I might try putting on the metronome during a later mile of the marathon, if I need some focusing and motivation to keep going.

10 Things

  1. rowers! running north, the coxswain’s voice seemed to be following me
  2. music coming from a bike — I think it was a song by Regina Spektor, but I’m not sure — I almost called out, hey! are you listening to Regina Spektor? I love Regina Spektor
  3. greeted Mr. Holiday — good morning!
  4. more red leaves, some yellow
  5. someone in running shorts standing beside the porta potty. Were they waiting — to use it, for a friend?
  6. a line-up cars — maybe 10 — behind a car turning left onto 32nd
  7. a biker zooming by — fast! — with a kid in a trailer
  8. under the franklin bridge, looking up at an opening above — not for the first time, I thought someone might be staying up there, but I can’t see well, so I could be wrong, and could anyone climb up to it — it’s 15-20 feet up?
  9. running through the dark tunnel of trees, looking ahead and seeing an opening: bright, white, glowing
  10. no sun or shadows or geese or goldenrod or acorns

Today’s Zombie poem:

To Live in the Zombie Apocalypse/ Burlee Vang

The moon will shine for God
knows how long.
As if it still matters. As if someone
is trying to recall a dream.
Believe the brain is a cage of light
& rage. When it shuts off,
something else switches on.
There’s no better reason than now
to lock the doors, the windows.
Turn off the sprinklers
& porch light. Save the books
for fire. In darkness,
we learn to read
what moves along the horizon,
across the periphery of a gun scope—
the flicker of shadows,
the rustling of trash in the body
of cities long emptied.
Not a soul lives
in this house &
this house & this
house. Go on, stiffen
the heart, quicken
the blood. To live
in a world of flesh
& teeth, you must
learn to kill
what you love,
& love what can die.

I want to think more about how darkness and light work in this poem, and the last line about killing what you love and loving what can die.

oct 1/RUN

3.1 miles
2 trails + extra
51 degrees

Finally, fall weather! Wore my bright orange sweatshirt today, which was too warm during the last mile. Ran above on the paved trail heading south, below on the Winchell trail heading north. Sunny, breezy, cool, dreamy. Tree shadows. My left hip was a little sore, but otherwise I felt strong and relaxed. I chanted Emily Dickinson for part of the run: life is but life/ and death but death/ bliss is but bliss/ and breath but breath then life is life/death is death/bliss is bliss/breath is breath then life life life life/death death death death/bliss bliss bliss bliss/breath breath breath breath.

Thought about the marathon and how long it’s been since I ran on the winchell trail and FWA and My Neighbor Totoro, which Scott and I watched last night. Also thought about zombies, which is my theme for October. Mostly I thought about bodies without minds and feeling like you’re trapped in a body and soul-less, indifferent, relentless bodies.

10 Things

  1. heading down to the Horace Cleveland Overlook, I was blinded by a circle of light on the river — so bright! impossible to see anything else
  2. the sharp crack of a squirrel opening an acorn
  3. kids on the playground — laughing, yelling
  4. water trickling out of the sewer pipe at 44th
  5. a few more slashes of red, a golden feeling*
  6. the surface of the winchell trail is in terrible condition — cracked, slanted, cratered
  7. bikers on a bench, taking a snack break
  8. a woman on the narrow winchell trail with a dog, off to the side and facing me, talking on a phone I couldn’t see, saying something about walking after 60
  9. someone sitting on the bench in a blue shirt near the overlook
  10. big trees on the ground, cut into sections and stacked beside the trail

*For the past few weeks, I’ve been seeing trees turning yellow everywhere, but when I mention it to Scott he says that they look perfectly green to him, not yellow at all. Since my color vision is questionable, I’ll take his word for it. I’ve decided to believe that I’m seeing the yellow that is coming, or the slightest idea — the inkling — of yellow that has arrived but only as a feeling or the whisper, yellow. This morning, as I stood at the kitchen counter, about to make my coffee, I noticed the reflection of my neighbor’s tree on the granite countertop. Yellow! Wow, I said to myself out loud, has that tree turned when I wasn’t looking? I looked out the window and checked the real tree: a golden feeling, but nothing more.

Another gold/en thing: Admiring the sun spilling through the treetops, feeling the crisper air, W.S. Merwin’s line from “To the Light of August” popped into my head: Still the high, familiar, endless summer, yet with a glint of bronze in chill mornings. I thought, not bronze, but gold.

some marathon experiments

During and after my run, I had 2 ideas for things to try while running 26.2 miles. First: pick 26 poems I’ve memorized to recite in my head as I run. One for each mile. The problem with this idea is not memorizing all the poems. I’ve already done that. The problem is remembering which poems I picked and for which mile! I imagined attempting to write a list on my arm, which seemed ridiculous and too unruly.

Second: for each mile, notice things that begin with one particular letter. Do this in alphabetical order. So, mile 1 = a, mile 2 = b, etc. I could also make a list of as many words that start with that letter as possible. This experiment might be fun, but it could also get tedious.

In addition to these experiments, I’ve been thinking that I need a mantra and/or a few lines from favorite poems to chant in difficult moments or when I want to be distracted. Yes! I’ll have to make a list today. Of course, ED’s life/death/bliss/breath is on this list!

zombies!

Today is the first day of Zombie month! I’m excited to explore this topic, which I don’t know that much about. Since the marathon is this Sunday and I’m also thinking a lot about that, I’ll ease into zombies this week.

When I think of zombies, I think: relentless, indifferent, hungry, mindless, brainless bodies. And this makes me think of Jaws as a relentless killing machine. Here’s a great poem I found on poetryfoundation:

Jaws/ Emma Hine

I don’t realize I’m starved
for the color until the blood

washes up on the beach.
I’m craving red but still

haven’t seen the creature,
just the quick whip and slither

of its tail in the wake
—and then there I am,

facing the skin side
of the animatronic shark.

The slick apertures of its eyes.
The mythic teeth.

The anvil nose beating
the deck, cracking windows.

The shark, like the moon, is
pockmarked, unstoppable,

never showing its hidden side.
Surely space is just another underwater,

the messages we send from satellites
a bleeding haze of infrared:

This is my blood type,
this is where I keep my body at night,

and I tell no one about the times
my body, taking over,

stands waist-deep in the surf,
some wild need inside me

ticking into place.

The slick apertures of its eyes. Yes — Jaws’ eyes are the worst: huge, empty, black. Is much made of zombies’ eyes? Anything distinctive, or do they just look dead and empty?