eating the last slice of apple pie
to the squeaks of hummingbird
who, two feet from me, dives in and out and in and out and in
of the yellow orange gold glow
of nasturtium flowers
whose plants spill out from porch edge and into yard
shimmering
_______
chaos has permission to live for once
nikki says, regarding the domestic junk drawer
the slowly changing landscape
the few flecks of snow (!)
i observe hurtling from sky to ground
out the office window
(though one has to be watching
with a very keen eye to catch sight of them) –
though it’s nothing
it’s still a little hard to take
after those 70 degree sunny days
of last week or so
_______
after mentioning facebook
in a hand-written letter that i tuck in a blue envelope
which is headed to isabel in chicago i write in the letter
it’s so gen x of me
to mention facebook in a handwritten letter
though maybe we’re actually xennials –
look it up on wikipedia
_______
showing juniper the return address
on aforementioned blue envlope
and how we both get a little celebratory
about the first time using the new address
whose street address line
is a matching length
to the city/state/zip code line
which is a relief
after the imbalance of the numbers and letters and two-word road name plus the lot number
against the city/state/zipe code of here
_______
the slowly-changing landscape
of real human headquarters’ interior:
floor stacks of books
and books stacked in boxes
in the living room
and now and then i go to reach for things
(the blank cards for writing and sending,
the book titles lined up on the shelf)
that are no longer there
_______
i wish i could sing the whole city a lullabye
i write to kp and sabrina in minneapolis
one that would magically soothe people
AND end white supremacy and police violence –
i mean, police terror
silver number 7
the colored pencil drawing
of the half and half carton
with lisi on it like a missing person ad
revealed from behind the flap
on the catdvent calendar
with the silver number 7 on it
_______
repositioning the safety pins
on my sliced winter coat,
mulberry colored,
so the fluff doesn’t fall/float out
_______
part myth, part possibility,
we run into richard on the road
walking his hypo allergenic dog molly
and he uses his whole hand
to show us the size of the paw prints
he found in the springthawed soft gravel/mud road
mountain lion he says
by the time we round the bend
by the time we round the bend
on the four plus mile walk
the wind is really whipping
and i hoot and holler into it
while scooping up dried corn crop leaves
and releasing them into the air
which grabs them and carries them, expedited,
across the gravel road with a tug and a whip
_______
cat killers juniper says
when i report that wendy’s new cat
has snot drool hanging out from her mouth
and tangled in her whiskers
(and after their other cat named “sick kitty” by us
[and “nigh nigh” by wendy’s kid]
eventually died from months and months and months
of a similar and likely easily treatable condition)
_______
a zoom/covid first:
a small handful of carolers
at tanja and evan’s door
singing wintry jesusy songs
and tanja/even carry ‘us’
(juniper and i and larry and ellen and
barbara and dan) to the door
and face the laptop outwards
so we can hear/see
as if the carolers had come to our own door
first
out on the porch at night
my hand on the soft fur of gray kitty who sits on the railing,
a glimmer out of the corner of my eye
and another dazzle following that:
the first firefly of the season blinking
another first (in my life/in ever?)
the minneapolis city council announced their intent today
to disband the police department
i want to be thought of as water
lake surface smooth
at first i think it is my own breath, visible and rising into the first-sun air
as i stretch on the mat on the deck
but then i notice it – a steam from the days of rain rising off the deck surface, and the cabin roof in the undeniable brightness of sun
and i think a little bit about how that’s what death is/can be like –
how i want to be thought of as water turning from solid to vapor rising
when i exit this world
_______
on this windless morning
how i try to make as little sound/splash as possible
each time i dip the paddle into the water
_______
we love you! i call out
to the two eagles taking off from pine tree tops
(most likely due to our raucous laughter rising from the canoe and kayak below)
_______
kick the cake joolie and i laugh
about the one remaining partial wedge of cake
that we are tempted to toss
into the woods – white frostinged and chocolated cake parts
we think about bears and snacks and not luring them too close to the cabin
that has been emptied of all food save for, like, 50 pounds of sugar in a tupperware
_______
how i could spend all day
at superior’s shore
raking smoothed stones with my fingers
because i want to see every color variation, every texture, every shape
_______
yao yao snuggled into my side
while i read the nighttime books aloud on the couch
it will look like we’re not moving but we are
the great gold light
on pine trunks and limbs
as seen outside the yellow cabin
at 8:10am –
how i watch it from the top bunk
dim and brighten again
with sleepy eyes
_______
ami and i welcoming morning
in the cool air on the wet dock
and eagle soaring in the distance
whose identity is given away
by the occasional flash of head/tail white we see
when ki turns in a certain direction
_______
like thunder shirts joolie and i joke
about the life preserver vests
we zip and buckle on
_______
hawk-eye daisy amber says
about the red/a little orange wildflower
sprouting up alone at the old homestead site
on our way back out to the gravel parking lot
_______
the gingham and rainbow shine patterned pencils
that i select from the geocache
on kid’s island
whose surface is covered
in the tan/goldorange
of fallen pine needles
_______
it will look like we’re not moving, but we are – mostly ami says
from her steering spot at the back of the canoe
while joolie provides the motor in the front
thirty degrees is the angle you want to be at to the waves on a windy day
_______
solitaireing on the floor
while we each take turns talking
and i find that i don’t like hearing
what i’m saying –
maybe because it all just sounds like old patterns
that i’m ready to break out of
ranging from tiny to small
water beads
ranging from tiny to small
collected on the backsides of fallen birch leaves
pressed flat onto the dark gray gravel road we walk
_______
the air a drizzle-mist
out over the lake
moving horizontally and northwards
_______
how we walk out
in the buzz of conversation
and walk back
in silence:
leaves
wet air
bending tree limbs
ground squirrels
coming alive in the quiet
_______
busting a gut
around the kitchen table
at the photo app
that gives us beards
or scrunched-closed puffy hoodies
or watermelon heads
or lazer eyes –
the weirder the better
_______
the big tree fallen
across the gravel forest road
how we are able to separate ki’s soft self
into moveable pieces
with our hands and feet
leaving enough space for a car to move through
low-fiving ferns
the ongoing joke about the comfort cart (a little wheeled caddie that we pretend ami is packing because it’s her comfort cart and she likes to take it wherever she goes, but really it’s just a caddie she’s taking up to the cabin to leave in the bathroom)
_______
the thundering froth/rush, red with iron (and chocolate-milk-y too)
of the st. louis river
whose waters are high this year
lined with slate rocks, jagged in their up-angled arrangements
_______
the full fall pallete of leaves turning in the distance –
a 70s golds and lime-yellows and orangey oranges and greens and an occasional red scheme
how it all looks so good rising up from the edge of the turbulent water
_______
fingers to moss
palms to lichen
low-fiving ferns
and the briskness/crispness of air
inhaled as we move along (and stray from) the wet paths sometimes matted with leaves
i am fed
_______
how we pull the canvas chairs in a semi-circle
around the small but warm fire glowing in the tear-drop shaped stove
and dine in its warmth,
bowls of warm peanut soup in our palms as we sip and slurp and stare off into the heat
_______
the glow of ami’s face in the candlelight
as ami and amber present the belated cake
sting/burn
the hot sting/burn on our fingers
near the end of the garlic fields
we move through with blue five gallon buckets,
snapping off scapes
and dropping them in
detail collector 