post 26 december

justwrite 26 december

I am going to tell you something real and you will feel there’s a difference a glimmering whisper of sense although I usually mention much less reasonable items today I was cooking I was looking outside and I was gathering ingredients there was a half a sky of sun and the slants over the buildings used the views to dry varied laundry and assorted rugs and the dustier ones were given massages of a forceful sort beaten full of sunlight as the dirt flew away there were loud sounds resounding across the courtyard and you’d think hardly reasonable and wouldn’t someone protest wouldn’t someone neglect the soup and turn to yell out the window hey you kids that’s enough or to call last night’s bluff those men in the rain singing out pain or hilarity in occasional harmony after a few rounds of the block taking stock of what they have and finding each other there are numbers we can’t add up ourselves but today from my shelves I drew down a recipe that perplexed me into poetry there were vegetables and the troubles they found themselves in sought light and water and escape from the dark earth the roots of their lives they found surprise in the sink and drank deeply and in the pot not ten minutes later the beet danced alone stronger than the others and requiring more time to contemplate the heat to seek out safety and to offer a hand to the carrots to follow and their fellow potatoes and what I heard as I made my lists and counted fists full of wants and needs was exceeding joy dancing in a covered pot poetry that’s not meant to be read but to be felt instead bouncing off the insides the metal laughing back as the beet playfully attacked each edge of the stage no sage could build an easier demonstration no consternation of interpretation just fascination with this beet meeting itself in the dark and dancing in the boiling heat of an antiquated stovetop

justwrite 25 december

when we take these steps we remember what’s next has little to do with what’s past we have the rest of our lives to surprise ourselves our lesser elves our greater gift-givers we shiver our way to warmth we resort to resorts we retort to unkind inkind donations our frustrations are easily seen in between our ears we fear to open our mouths too wide lest the moths run and hide inside escaping from the park into the dark and waiting for the morning the dawning the yawning impossibility of lonely sleep when in the deep the velvet cake is a sweet escape I’m ready to make a trip of that sort I’m ready to retort with torte and also with language the spin within a thousand rounds of rebounding vision I am summarizing revision but in the meantime you may think I’m making all this up this elaborate ruse to confuse the illusions to confess a profusion of blotters all the ink fit to think spins these needles and pins those wheedling tongues down to a dollar less a pound or maybe it’s more like a meter a neater fit to be tied and if you hide your mittens from those bad kittens then they’ll just have to best your rukavetz your gloves your supposedly multilingual triangles of stitching letting out the stuffing from a tough-enough day no warning for such a morning no lock for such a stock on sale to no avail but once I have a calendar we’ll see who’s blurring the lines between the best and worst of times