Sometimes it’s a grace to do nothing.
today (September 5th)
i woke and wandered through dreams
(even now i only have a few scattered images. nothing to tell)
and was jerked awake by Eric calling
i heard his voice on the answermachine and it pulled me to
consciousness
i rememeber actually kinda wrestling with the covers and the cold
grabbing the edge of the mattress to pull and propell myself towards
the phone
we talked a bit
and i was mostly sleepy and giggly and kinda awed.
i’m like that…
…sometimes…
and that was a good wake-up-call.
but i jumped back in bed to hide from the cold
and read some of Little,Big
i did a little yoga
drank my mum’s potion
and ate some apples
by then it the sun had graced the deck
and i moved outside
and started reading the Translator
what is it called
when the cold wave passes through you (me)
and i’m about to cry?
so beautiful
remembering things we all forget
i warmed some pizza and kilbasa (is that how it’s spelled?)
ate it
and then went read more Translator
then moved the logs outside
and swept the garage area
then went to read more of the Translator
the charecter was in book store
and found a collection of poems from the soviet union
during the cold war
in which this story is set…
there was a poem in there by her poetry teacher
(who had recently escaped (been exiled) from Russia
i read this:
After long thought I have at last decided:
I must write to denounce my neighbor.
Evidence both seen and invisible has so accumulated
That it cannot be ignored
And I know what my duty is.
I believe that nothing that has been reported can ever be erased,
And everything unreported likewise will not go unrecorded,
And everything that can be known is somewhere known,
If we are vigilant, and if we have done our duty.
I will tell how once returning home
On an evening when snow was beginning to fall
Seeing the light far off in his window
He began unaccountably to weep
And for a time could not go on.
It lasted only moments and he has forgotten it but there is no denying
it.
I will denounce my neighbor for it is my duty
As smiling boys do their duty to wild birds:
Once, he cut a cabbage in half, and saw that the two halves
Were a deamon’s face and its reflection;
And he wondered if symmetry was the deepest truth about the world
Or if he only wondered at it because of his own division,
Himself a creature struck in two as by a swordcut
One half the inexact mirror of the other.
I will write if I can find paper and a pen
Though there have been sudden shortages lately of these things
Shortages that are certainly someone’s fault
But around here we have done all right without these and other things.
If i can find no paper or pen, I will write in the wet sand
With one arm of a broken pliers;
I will sew letters together with hawthorns and straw,
I will write in spit on the pale undersides of leaves,
I will write with the torn hieroglyphics of moonlight on water.
It is my duty as a citizen not to keep these things hidden
But to bring them to the attention of those who need to know.
————————-
and
as any charecter
at that moment
it seemed so poignant to me.
looked for a bike around the house
perhaps roller blades?
used the keys to open the many locks
and
after dissapointment
to re-lock them.
i packed a bag
bottle of water
book
warm shirt
and left to walk into town
to here
to write.
funny, i feel embarrassed now
had typed out much more
but then cut it and spared ya from it
the gloaming is nearly over
so i will walk home soon
and come back
reborn