Woke up this morning and decided I should take a day off from running. Went on 2 walks instead and enjoyed being outside on my deck as much as possible while my high school aged son took 2 AP tests–AP Chemistry and AP Physics–back to back in his room. Such a strange time.
I memorized my next green poem on the deck: Instructions for Not Giving Up/ Ada Limón. It was easier to memorize than Larkin’s The Trees. Why? I think formal meter trips me up. Sitting on the deck, repeating the first line over and over–“More than the fuchsia funnels breaking out of the crabapple tree” “More than the fuchsia funnels breaking out of the crabapple tree”–I wasn’t thinking at all about the fuchsia funnels breaking out of the big crabapple tree in my backyard. This year, the blossoms are exceptional. It wasn’t until I was out walking through the neighborhood with Scott and Delia the dog, looking at the brightly colored flowers on the trees, that I realized it. I guess I was too focused on remembering the words. I love how memorizing these poems helps me to spend more time with them and to acquire better words for the world around me. I wouldn’t have thought to describe the flowers as fuchsia funnels, but it really fits. Now, as I walk around the neighborhood, all I can see is one fuchsia funnel after another.
a hiding bird + more turkeys!
Maybe I should start calling the tree graveyard turkey meadow instead? Every time I’m there I see wild turkeys. Last night, Scott and I watched one crossing the road, its head awkwardly bobbing back and forth. A few minutes, later we heard a bird calling out loudly, repeatedly. We stopped and stared up at the big tree where we thought it was, but neither of us could spot it. I wish I would have recorded its call. I can’t remember it now. Was it another Northern Cardinal? A goldfinch?