Month: April 2020

april 4/WALKBIKERUN

walk 1: 2 miles
Edmund Bvld
30 degrees
Deaths from COVID-19: 24 (MN)/ 8,407 (US)

Walked with Scott, Delia the Dog, and my daughter this morning. Nice, crisp air. Sunny. Hardly any wind. A perfect morning for a run, but I decided to only walk. Trying not to push it too much with the running. They’ve turned the river parkway into a one-way and created a lane for walkers. Will this help enable people to get more distance from each other? Not sure. I’ll check it out tomorrow when I run. Felt great to be outside and moving. Heard at least one cardinal, several crows, a woodpecker. Anything else? There were traces of the snow from yesterday still settled around the trees in the grass by Edmund. Walked by the Cyclops Baby on the garage door again. Enjoyed walking with my daughter–only her second time outside in almost a month.

bike: 27 minutes
bike stand, basement
run: 1.1 miles
treadmill, basement

Gave myself another easy day in the basement today. Watched some of a Joan Didion documentary–The Center Will Not Hold–and listened to Harry Styles as I ran. Don’t remember thinking about much. Happy to be able to move and breathe and not always be worrying.

Poem/ Charles Bernstein – 1950-

here. Forget.
There are simply tones
cloudy, breezy
birds & so on.
Sit down with it.
It’s time now.
There is no more natural sight.
Anyway transform everything
silence, trees
commitment, hope
this thing inside you
flow, this movement of eyes
set of words
all turns, all grains.
At night, shift
comets, “twirling planets,
suns, bits of illuminated pumice”
pointing out, in harsh tones
cancers & careers.
“Newer Limoges please.”
Pick some value
mood, idea, type or smell of paper
iridescent, lackluster
&, “borne in peach vessels,”
just think
“flutter & cling”
with even heavier sweep
unassuaged
which are the things
of a form, etc
that inhere.
Fair adjustment
becomes space between
crusts of people
strange, rending:
as sound of some importance
diffuses
“as dark red circles”
digress, reverberate
connect, unhook.
Your clothes, for example
face, style
radiate mediocrity
coyly, slipping
& in how many minutes
body & consciousness
deflect, “flame on flare”
missed purpose.
Your eyes
glaze
thought stumbles, blinded
speck upon speck
ruffling edges.
“But do not be delighted yet.”
The distance positively entrances.
Take out pad & pen
crystal cups, velvet ashtray
with the gentility of easy movement
evasive, unaccountable
& puffing signs
detach, unhinge
beyond weeds, chill
with enthusiastic smile
& new shoes
“by a crude rotation”
hang
a bulk of person
“ascending,” “embodied.”

I want to spend some time with this poem, thinking about it. Check out the erasure I did of it on April 6th.

april 3/BIKE

bike: 35 minutes
bike stand, basement
Deaths from COVID-19: 22 (MN)/ 6,605 (US)

Biking in the basement this afternoon. When I went down there, everything was brown. When I came back up, most of it was white. A dusting of snow. Classic April in Minnesota. Finished the documentary about Merrily We Roll Along while I biked. Lots of great reflections on what we do/fail to do with our lives.

Decided not to run today. Time to give my legs a break. It’s difficult not running. It really helps with stress over rising body counts and expected surges in cases. But it would be worse to run and get injured so I didn’t run.

Found out last night that they have cancelled all summer parks activities. No open swim this year. No open beaches at all. So sad, but necessary. I can’t imagine swimming this summer. It will be hard to wait another year–will all of my central vision be gone by then? Will I even be able to see the buoys to swim?

BREATH/ Lee Potts

We can only carry so much breath with us
and I learned then that it may not be enough. 

Every summer morning, we rushed
to be the first body to break
the pool surface, still
and cold as a bare marble altar
long stripped of cloth and candle.

Diving from the deep end’s edge
I followed my open, empty hands
into what was once
mist or cloud or untidy ocean
before being bleached
and boxed in for us.

Down toward the drain,
a starless night sky
just beyond its iron grate.

A thin current pulled past.
Ghost tide needing no moon,
that never turned, that kept
whatever it washed away.

Love this line: “what was once/ mist or cloud or untidy ocean/ before being bleached/ and boxed in for us.” Also the idea of a starless night sky by the drain and a thin current.

april 2/RUN

4 miles
edmund, south/45th/edmund, north/32nd street, west/43rd ave, south
51 degrees
Deaths from COVID-19: 18 (MN)/ 5100+ (US)

Bracing for scarier weeks as the virus continues to spread in the U.S. Minnesota is supposed to reach the peak in late May/early June. Ordered groceries (including toilet paper) online to pick up. It will be ready on Saturday, April 11th. Glad we’re stocked until then. Such strange, unsettling, terrifying, exhausting times.

Ran the new route that Scott and I discovered yesterday. South on Edmund, on the grass after 42nd street, past Becketwood, back on Edmund, right on 45th street, Becketwood, grass, north on Edmund, right on 32nd street/left on 43rd ave. It was 4 miles. Not too bad. Encountered a few people on Edmund but that was it. A nice route. It would have been nicer if I hadn’t been running straight into a 14mph wind for a lot of it. What do I remember? Listening to my feet shuffle on the grit. Noticing the river through the trees as I ran at the highest point on Edmund, between 36th and 35th streets. It was cloudy so it wasn’t glowing and too far to see any detail, but it was beautiful. I think I heard some birds. Don’t remember any woodpeckers. Oh–I think I heard a wedge of geese honking high up in the sky. Heard some chainsaws. Some people talking. Another runner said hello but I wasn’t sure if it was to me or someone else. Felt pretty good running. Don’t remember what I thought about. I do remember, as I returned on Edmund starting to feel too warm. Took my pink jacket off and zipped it up while running, then put it around my waist. Quite the feat. I probably looked ridiculous.

Last night, during one of the many times I got up with restless legs, I started composing a variation to “Auto-lullaby,” one of the poems I like to recite while I’m running.

A Pandemic Lullaby/ Sara Lynne Puotinen

Think of a sheep
reciting a poem;
Think of a tree stump
housing a gnome.

Think of your dog
asleep in a chair;
Think of that time
when you cut your own hair.

Think of a bird
that sings in your ear;
Try to resist
suffocating from fear.

Think of Cyclops Baby on
a garage door;
Think of a run, and
count to four.

If you are anxious, then
take a deep breath.
The outcome most likely
is sickness not death.

For now, I’ll stick with this ending, but I’m not satisfied. I’ll keep working on it. Read it to Scott and he didn’t really like my original first stanza: Think of a sheep/ cooking your breakfast;/ think of that summer/ when you visited Texas. Partly because he didn’t think it rhymed, partly because I’ve never visited Texas in summer. I’m not sure; I like how breakfast and Texas work together, but I decided to switch it up and connect it more to what I like to think about in order to feel better.

While searching for “april” in poets.org, I came across this poem. It’s not about April–well, it could be talking about April in Minnesota.

Because You Asked about the Line Between Prose and Poetry/ Howard Nemerov – 1920-1991

Sparrows were feeding in a freezing drizzle
That while you watched turned to pieces of snow 
Riding a gradient invisible
From silver aslant to random, white, and slow.

There came a moment that you couldn’t tell.
And then they clearly flew instead of fell.

april 1/WALKBIKERUN

walk: 3.5 miles
edmund bvld, south/north
45 degrees
Deaths from COVID-19: 17 (MN)/ 4.749 (US)

bike: 26 minutes
bike stand, basement
run: 1.2 miles
treadmill, basement

Scott and I took Delia the dog on a long walk this morning. We discovered that there is a trail that connects Edmund at 42nd with Edmund farther south. Hooray! I’m excited to try it out tomorrow. I should be able to run over 4 miles that way. As we walked near Becketwood, across from the double bridge, I noticed 2 big birds soaring above us. Bald eagles, we both decided. One was close, the other much higher in the sky, both circling. Riding a thermal? So cool.

In the afternoon, I biked in the basement to get my exercise minutes (a 72 minutes, 3.5 mile walked didn’t earn me a single minute of exercise on my apple watch). Watched more of the S Soundheim/Hal Prince documentary about the failed 1981 musical, Merrily We Roll Along. Finished by running 1.2 miles on the treadmill.

Starting off national poetry month with one of my favorite poets, Maggie Smith.

Rain, New Year’s Eve/ Maggie Smith (from Good Bones)

The rain is a broken piano,
playing the same note over and over.

My five-year-old said that.
Already she knows loving the world

means loving the wobbles
you can’t shim, the creaks you can’t

oil silent–the jerry-rigged parts,
MacGyvered with twine and chewing gum.

Let me love the cold rain’s plinking.
Let me love the world the way I love

my your son, not only when
he cups my face in his sticky hands,

but when, roughhousing,
he accidentally splits my lip.

Let me love the world like a mother.
Let me be tender when it lets me down.

Let me listen to the rain’s one note
and hear a beginner’s song.