Loved the weather this morning! Hardly any wind, not too bright, not too cold. Scott and I drove over to a parking lot near Highland Bridge and ran beside the Mississippi River past Hidden Falls to the confluence where the Minnesota and Mississippi rivers meet. Wow! Such soft, sweeping views! Heard lots of chickadees (chick a dee dee dee) and ran up and down lots of little hills.
10+ Things
a cracked rutted cratered trail
steps leading down to a bridge across the river — something to try next time!
empty benches on the edge
a recently re-painted parking lot below the confluence with jaunty arrows on the pavements — I said they looked like they were italicized
the tops of the bare branches looked fuzzy and soft and gray
2 rivers curving around an island
more white sand than usual — the river is low
running through Highland bridge, I could hear a dog relentlessly barking at the dog park
hidden falls was steadily flowing down limestone and concrete ledges
a few slick, icy spots on the bridge
geese! A gaggle of geese on the edge of the trail, only the final one acknowledged our presence with a sharp honk — no hiss, thankfully
A little warmer today. Another beautiful run. What a view! Clear and through the trees to the river and the other side. I love November and its blues, grays, browns, and golds from a few trees still holding onto their leaves. I felt relaxed and strong — lungs and legs.
Listened to rustling leaves, striking feet, dripping ravines for the first 2 miles of the run. Put in Taylor Swift’s new version of 1989 for the last mile.
10 Things
a single leaf floating through the air, then down to the ground — was it brown or gold or green?
the steady dripping of water out of the sewer pipe
the smell of something burnt — toast? coffee? — but from a house or the gorge and not longfellow grill
a runner in a bright yellow shirt, running across the road, then through the grass below edmund, then onto the dirt trail in front of me
the steps down to the winchell trail are closed, with a chain across the railings, but I went around on the dirt path
the winchell trails was covered in yellow leaves
the roar of a chainsaw from across the gorge
kids’ voices from the playground at Minnehaha Academy
a biker on the walking trail where it dips below the road and hangs above the floodplain forest
a bright headlight from a bike, glowing in the grayish gloom
Through my little window, I see one day the entire bird, the next just a leeward wing, the next only a painful call, which, without the body, makes beautiful attachments by even attaching at all.
This poem reminds me of my own experiments in trying to determine how little information (especially visual data) I need in order to recognize or identify or be aware of the presence of some thing.
Poetry is not a Project
Two days ago, at the end of my entry, I posted about a pamphlet I was reading, Poetry is not a Project. I offered some notes from the first section, Habitus, and promised to do the rest in later entries. Here’s the rest. Instead of a lot of notes, I decided to condense it into a key passage from each section.
Poetry is Not a Project / Dorothy Lasky
Habitus
Poems are living things that grow from the earth into the brain, rather than things that are planted within the earth by the brain.
The road through a poem is a series of lines, like a constellation, all interconnected. Poems take place in the realm of chance, where the self and the universal combine, where life exists.
On the same site, Ugly Duckling Press, where I found Lasky’s pamphlet, I also found this chapbook, Almost Perfect Forms, in which the author creates the constellations out of ands and ors found in Dreams and Stones by Magdalena Tulli.
How We Write and What We Write For
Because poets make language and make language beautiful. Because beautiful language makes a new and beautiful world. Because poets live and make a new world, which beautiful language itself creates.
4.3 miles minnehaha falls and back 30 degrees / feels like 22
Yes, another wonderful run! I love breathing in this cold air. Everything that has been almost closed opens up. A lot of the snow has melted, but there were a few patches on the grass. The path was almost completely bare and dry, only one or two short stretches of ice. The falls were roaring. I passed a guy talking on his phone (he was in shorts, of course), showing whoever he was talking to the falls — these falls are so beautiful (at least I think that’s what he said).
I tried chanting in threes:
I am girl /I am ghost/ I am gorge Girl Ghost Gorge/ Girl Ghost Gorge Girl / Ghost / Gorge Girl Girl Girl / Ghost Ghost Ghost / Gorge Gorge Gorge Girl Ghost Gorge / Ghost Gorge Girl / Gorge Girl Ghost
I was hoping I find some way into words about my haunts poems. It started with one: obsession (which I thought about before my run too. See below). I was thinking about how I return to the gorge again and again, day after day, wanting to be there, wanting to find better words, wanting to establish (once and for all?) that this place is my home. I haunt this place, as ghost and girl.
10 Things
honking geese (just before going out for my run)
snow mixed with ice mixed with yellow leaves
a strange noise — a big pipe clanging mournfully (not exactly sure what was happening, but the noise was caused by a city worker patching the path)
the sharp smell of tar
a woman and her dog walking on the double bridge
a few patches of ice under the ford bridge
running past the cold, silent meadow, almost hearing the buzz of bugs from earlier in the fall
rushing, gushing, roaring falls
crossing over the grassy trail (to avoid the work being done on the path), running over little piles of snow and leaves, my foot sinking into a hidden hole
listening to a playlist for the second half of my run, running on the far edge of the road, being passed by a car hauling a trailer
I was just about to write that I forgot to look at the river, but I just remembered that I did and that I saw one spot that looked like it could almost be ice.
Stopped at my favorite falls spot and took a few seconds of video before turning on a playlist and starting to run again. Watching this video, it seems less white and wintery than it felt when I was there.
minnehaha falls / 1 nov 2023
before the run
I wrote this before my run. It made me feel hopeful that I’m getting closer to a way into a months long obsession.
It’s November and I’m feeling the itch to start (or return to) a big project. Me and my projects. I feel unsettled, lost, irritated, overwhelmed without them.
Not everyone likes the word project as the way to describe what a poet is doing when working on some thing (or, working on nothing, when nothing is not no thing but that empty, unknown space, the void). I guess the idea of a project bothers me a little too — too organized, structured, disciplined. Maybe I’ll start calling it my latest obsession? But an obsession with some direction; the goal = (temporarily) exhausting my feelings/thoughts/understandings/experiences with a certain thing. To write and write and write about a thing until I’m exhausted, emptied or satisfied, at least temporarily.
The difficulty right now is that I have too many obsessions: the periphery, the other side/lifting the veil, living in a land of almosts, girl/ghost/gorge, RUN! as an archive. Where should I land? Which one should I choose? Perhaps I should avoid settling on something so BIG and important, and search for a small, off to the side way in?
Ever since I encountered a chapbook by Dorothy Lasky, Poetry is Not a Project, I’ve been critical/uncertain about my own use of project as a way to describe what I’m doing. I think I first encountered it in year 2 (2018) and I don’t think I actually read it. I just remember feeling uneasy with its title. And that unease has stuck. I think I’ll read it now.
note: I did read it and loved it and then went out for my wonderful run. Now, 3 hours later, I’m back and ready to read it again and then write about it a little.
There’s a lot I could write about in this wonderful pamphlet and its 4 sections: Habitus; An Example; What is Really Not Intention, But Life; and How We Write, and What We Write For. So, I want to break it down over 4 log entries. Today: Habitus
Habitus
I think poems come from the earth and work through the mind from the ground up. I think poems are living things that grow from the earth into the brain, rather than things that are planted within the earth by the brain. I think a poet intuits a poem and a scientist conducts a “project.”
She is not satisfied with this distinction, feeling it’s not quite correct, then ends this page with the following hope:
But I do think there is a distinction. And the distinction, I think, is very important to how we come to think of poetry in the 21st century. Because I want this new century to be full of people who write poems, not full of poets who conduct projects and do nothing more.
On the next page, she discusses why projects are useful for poets: they bring in money and respect.
A poet with a project has everything set out before he even gets started. A poet with a nameable project seems wise, and better than other poets with unnameable ones.
She calls this out as BS. Then she discusses intuition and its importance for poetry, how the outside world of an artist blends and blurs with our internal drives. This blending and blurring can be difficult to name.
Love this bit:
Naming your intentions is great for some things, but not for poetry. Projects are bad for poetry. I might argue that a poet with a “project” that he can lucidly discuss is a pretty boring poet, at best.
when a poet interacts with the field or domain of poetry, she is aware of the immense history she represents in her words enough to let herself be crushed by it.
She then argues that poetic “projects” can be toxic to established and new poets, creating pressure by demanding the poets know exactly what they are doing and be able to articulate it to others. She closes this section with,
a poem, as a thing, resists being talked about linearly in its very nonlinearity. In its very nonlinear life. In the poem’s actual life, goddamn them.
Here, I was planning to write some of my thoughts, but I’m struggling to describe why/how Lasky’s ideas resonate for me. I think I’ll write about the other 3 sections and then respond.
But, just one more thing: Lasky’s discussion of our inability to know or express what a poem is in the form of a project, reminds me of a definition of wild that I revisited this morning:
wild = capacity of all things to elude the mind’s appropriations
3 miles treadmill, basement 35 degrees / feels like 28 windy / earlier, snow
It snowed last night. Maybe 2 inches. I decided to run in the basement instead of going outside in the cold and the wind. While I ran I listened to a You Are Good episode about the horror movie, The Changeling. I’m not familiar with the movie but it’s on the horror movie puzzle we’re working on right now, so I was curious. Now I think I want to see it.
Not much to remember about my run. Can I think of 10 things?
Almost 10 Things
I forgot my headband and even though my hair was pulled back in a ponytail, stray hairs kept flying out and into my face. I think running on the treadmill must cause static
the hairs feel like little spider webs and are annoying
I thought sweat would help tame these hairs, but it didn’t. They kept harassing all through the run
I briefly stepped off the treadmill mid-run to set up the podcast. The belt made a loud whirr that sounded like it might fly off at any minute
sometimes, but not all the time, I forgot my feet were touching the ground and I felt like I was floating
on the podcast they talked about how the main character, George C. Scott, was an old dad — he was in his 50s, but was an old 50s — Sarah Marshall called it a 70s 50s. She also compared him to her dad and said that they were both born smoking cigarettes, which aged them more rapidly
why is that what I remember?
my left hip was a little stiff
treadmills are boring and I kept looking at my watch, hoping the time was going faster
I don’t like running on treadmills that often. We just rejoined the Y for the winter so maybe I won’t have to? If I do, I’d like to do some interesting experiments. Maybe more reciting poetry or listening to more podcasts or audio books?
It’s Halloween, and here’s a wonderful poem in celebration of it:
The Crayola crayon box on skinny legs squeezes close to the patch-eyed pirate on my doorstep, goodie bags outstretched
like ours were long ago—We knew we were the lucky ones, living in the apartments, where we scored more
M&Ms and Snickers bars in twenty minutes than the kids in fancy houses did in an hour. But it wasn’t the candy that enticed us,
most of mine forgotten on the kitchen shelf for months after the initial gorging. It was the whole town complicit
with superheroes and monsters, my sister morphed into a frog in Mom’s t-shirt and green socks, Mr. Carson dressed in fluorescent
skeleton bones we dashed past to reach the fairy godmother at the front door, our faces upturned and open—
We forgot if we were a kid who couldn’t spell, a boy sprouting acne at nine. We just fastened a lion’s fuzzy face over our own and roared.
Speaking of Halloween, we have had the same decorations for 6 or 7 years. Cheap Target skeleton lights, a styrofoam tombstone, and hands and a skull that light up and look they’re coming out of the earth. It’s not amazing, but I like decorating a little and it looks cool from down the street. For the past week, the lights haven’t been working and I couldn’t figure out why. Scott finally checked: someone cut the cord. Why? Such a bummer.
5.4 miles franklin loop 25 degrees / feels like 20
Yes! A great temperature for running. I love the cold air and not getting overheated. Wore black running tights, black running shorts, my 10 year-old base layer green shirt, an orange sweatshirt, black gloves, a hat and a buff. Such a great run. I feel satisfied and happy and energized. A great start to the winter running season!
the Welcoming Oaks are almost bare. Where was I when the leaves fell? hello friends!
a bright white circle of sunlit river burning through the growing gap between the trees
everywhere more of a view to the other side
empty blueish gray water — so calm and pleasing to my eyes
passed Daddy Long Legs, dressed in black. His hi was so quiet it didn’t register until it was too late to call back a greeting
Hi Dave! — greeting Dave, the Daily Walker in the final mile
crossing the bridge, approaching 2 talkative runners from behind: excuse me. / Oh! [a runner jumps to the side looking freaked out] / Sorry I scared you!
the smell of smoke down below on the east side of the river
a roller skier! I couldn’t hear the clicking and clacking of his ski poles until I was right next to me
bats, bells, noisy road work, and late fall leaves
Found this poem from DH Lawrence the other day while looking for poems about bats. Wow, he didn’t like bats!
At evening, sitting on this terrace, When the sun from the west, beyond Pisa, beyond the mountains of Carrara Departs, and the world is taken by surprise …
When the tired flower of Florence is in gloom beneath the glowing Brown hills surrounding …
When under the arches of the Ponte Vecchio A green light enters against stream, flush from the west, Against the current of obscure Arno …
Look up, and you see things flying Between the day and the night; Swallows with spools of dark thread sewing the shadows together.
A circle swoop, and a quick parabola under the bridge arches Where light pushes through; A sudden turning upon itself of a thing in the air. A dip to the water.
And you think: “The swallows are flying so late!”
Swallows?
Dark air-life looping Yet missing the pure loop … A twitch, a twitter, an elastic shudder in flight And serrated wings against the sky, Like a glove, a black glove thrown up at the light, And falling back.
Never swallows! Bats! The swallows are gone.
At a wavering instant the swallows gave way to bats By the Ponte Vecchio … Changing guard.
Bats, and an uneasy creeping in one’s scalp As the bats swoop overhead! Flying madly.
Pipistrello! Black piper on an infinitesimal pipe. Little lumps that fly in air and have voices indefinite, wildly vindictive;
Wings like bits of umbrella.
Bats!
Creatures that hang themselves up like an old rag, to sleep; And disgustingly upside down.
Hanging upside down like rows of disgusting old rags And grinning in their sleep. Bats!
In China the bat is symbol for happiness.
Not for me!
Today, writing this bit before my run, I’m thinking about bats and echos and echolocation. Vibrations, reverberations, sounds that haunt by continuing to ring out. Bells. But, back to the echoes. In addition to bats, I’m thinking about a stanza from a favorite Halloween poem that I posted on this day in 2020:
A ghost, though invisible, still is like a place your sight can knock on, echoing; but here within this thick black pelt, your strongest gaze will be absorbed and utterly disappear: from Black Cat/ Rainer Maria Rilke
Speaking of haunting, relentless sounds: I am sitting at my desk in the front room and city workers are paving the hole they made in the street in July or August. So loud! Beep beep beep. Rrrruuummmbbbllleee. Scrape scrape, tamp tamp. Even the visual noise echoes — a flash flash flash of the lights on the truck as it dumps the gravel or tar or whatever they’re putting in the hole. Everything is vibrating — the street, my jaw, my chair, the windows. Difficult to think or to write while this is happening!
At the end of my run, having crossed the river road to walk in the grassy, leaf covered boulevard, I was distracted by the delightful noise of fallen leaves. Then I noticed a bare tree, its still green leaves scattered around it.
We did it! Scott and I ran together in our first race in 4 years. Much slower than I’ve ever run a 10k, but it doesn’t matter because we did it without stopping, especially on the final hill. And I felt good at the end and even smiled. Hooray! The only part I didn’t like was before the race. It was freezing. I was dressed in my usual winter attire — tights, a green shirt, orange sweatshirt, black vest, gloves, and a buff — but it wasn’t enough. I was so cold that I felt like I might throw up. I’m fine running outside when it’s very cold, but I have to be moving, which we weren’t for almost an hour.
10 Things
the cobblestones at the beginning were a challenge — so uneven and broken
David S. Pumpkins and his 2 ghosts were running the race
also a guy portaging a canoe — an actual canoe! I wonder if he was running the 10k or the marathon
other costumes: 2 m-n-ms — red, 2 oompa loompas, curious george and the man with the yellow hat
a guy dressed up like the granny from Little Red Riding Hood
running down a hill, I passed one of the leaders of the race running back up it. I thought I heard hime call out, only 5?! as he passed the 5 mile marker
one runner approaching another one and calling out, I love your earrings! They make your outfit look extra special
a guy in a banana costume struggling up the first hill, wheezing loudly and breathing heavily
bump/bump bump bump/ bump bump buuuuummp (overheard: the opening to “eye of the tiger” at the top of the hill)
speeding up on the stone arch bridge and (almost) sprinting across the line with Scott with a huge smile on my face — a great race!
adding this several hours later: I found this poem on HAD (havehashad.com) and I didn’t want to wait until the next time I run to post it, so here it is:
The fact they call Casper friendly Means he probably isn’t Probably a real piece of shit The type of ghost Who keeps business unfinished Just to stick around Longer than anyone wants One time grandpa fell on a knife And grandma said a ghost did it And I bet it was fucking Casper I don’t trust him for one fuck And don’t care if he hears it, either Haunt me, baby HAUNT ME!!! One day I’ll be a ghost, too And then we’ll see who’s friendly We’ll beef until the sun explodes Eats the earth and everything else And that will be the end of all business Unfinished or not
2.7 miles 2 trails 37 / feels like 29 wind: 15 mph
Okay winter. Wore tights under my shorts, a long-sleeved shirt under my sweatshirt, gloves and a buff. The only part of me that was cold: my ears. Now, sitting at my desk, they burn. Blustery out there. Swirling wind. A few times I mistook a falling leaf for a flying bird, which was very cool to see. A brown bird, floating by.
My legs were sore. I’m eager to get my blood checked at my physical in a few weeks. My iron might still be low. Until then, more burgers and a new multi vitamin that’s not quite a choking hazard.
10 Things
more of a view today: cold blue water through the remaining red and yellow leaves
slippery leaves covering the trail — don’t fall!
near the sidewalk at 36th and 46th: a deep hole, dug up by the city workers, not as neat or wide as the holes carved out on our street, more like a gash or a missing chunk ripped out
walkers bundled up in winter coats with hats and gloves
the entrance to the Winchell trail, which was shrouded in yellow the other day, was open and bare today
dripping water at the ravine — drip drip drip
looking down at the gorge from the edge, a pleasing palette: steel blue, dark green, gray, brown
a brown leaf fluttering by my face, looking like a floating bird
at least 3 or 4 lonely, empty benches
a kid’s voice below — would I encounter them later? Yes
Revisiting a poem I posted on this day in 2020, My Doubt/ Jane Hirshfield, these lines reminded me of something:
the lines:
I would like to grow content in you, doubt, as a double-hung window settles obedient into its hidden pulleys and ropes.
the something:
Dance with the pain
That last one is something I describe a lot. What does that even mean? It means to greet the pain or discomfort like an old friend. Know that it’s always there waiting for you. If you accept it, and envision yourself enjoying its company, it’s much more manageable.
Being content with the doubt and greeting pain as an old friend. Accepting doubt and being content with it I think I can do, but befriending pain? I’ve been trying to work on that as part of this larger writing/living/moving project. The pain I’m thinking of is the pain in my knees or my back or my hips, but it’s also other, deeper pains: the pain of aging, loved ones dying, living within a body that doesn’t work as well. Not sure if I’d call it a friend yet, more like acquaintances. I think it’s possible, but what does enjoying the company of pain look like, outside of the model of sadomasochism?
3.1 miles trestle turn around 57 degrees / drizzle
Waited for the rain to stop, then went out for a late morning run. Listened to the squeaks of my feet on the wet leaves, the drips from the trees and the eaves, workers on a neighbor’s roof as I ran north. Listened to a playlist on the way back south. The sidewalks were slippery and covered with red and yellow leaves. The paved trail had some puddles. I remember looking at the river through the trees, but I can’t remember what it looked like. Probably gray.
The strangest moment of the run happened near the beginning as I ran through the neighborhood on my way to the river. The sidewalk was covered in intensely red and yellow leaves and so was the sky, from an orange tree. Everything glowed, even me in my bright orange sweatshirt. Wow! I decided that once I finished my run, I’d come back to this spot and take some video:
A sidewalk covered in red and yellow leaves. In person it glowed, but when I look at it on the screen, it is dull.
