5.15 miles
bottom of franklin and back
33 degrees
Some wind, lots of sun and shadows and spring feelings. Heard some black-capped chickadees, was dazzled by the sun shining off a parked car, saw some new graffiti on a sign at the bottom of the hill.
Often my legs felt heavy. But my calves were quiet.
Heard a woodpecker knocking on wood somewhere near the rowing club and thought: a door!
Anybody
home? The
woodpecker
knocks on
the tree like
it was
dinner’s door.
Recited ED’s “I felt a Funeral, in my Brain” throughout the run and got most of the lines.
Had some great thoughts while I ran about ED’s funeral poem and how it fits with running and the feeling of moving past (beside) your Self to a space beyond thinking and seeing, where you’re feeling and hearing. Thought about the gradual process ED describes — her repeated use of and and then — for how we break through to a different world where Space — began to toll/As all the Heavens were a Bell/And being, but an Ear. I had many other thoughts, but I’d like to think through them and post tomorrow.
ED’s Daily Delight (feb 28)
the line: Superior — for doors — (from “I dwell in Possibility”)
In November and December, while I was working on the revision of my Haunts poem, I started writing a series of door poems, inspired by a Mary Oliver line from Upstream:
I did not think of language as the means to self-description. I thought of it as the door–a thousand opening doors!–past myself.
Upstream/ Mary Oliver
Looking for
ways out,
hoping for
ways in,
finding doors
open
everywhere
Then I wrote a series of brief 3/2 poems describing the “doors” I’ve found by the gorge. I’d like to keep adding to them, using my 10 Things lists for inspiration.
Before I do that, I found this reference to doors while rereading a Feb 28, 2022 entry:
The sound of boots tamping snow are the hinges
of many doors being opened.
(from Statement of Teaching Philosophy/ Keith Leonard
I like the idea of doors opening or being opened. Opening/being opened suggests that something — language or poetry or the sound of boots triggering memories — is doing that opening. But I also like the idea of doors already open that you have to notice.
from December 2023 “10 Things” Lists:
dec 1: most of the steps down to the Winchell Trail are closed off with a chain, but not the old stone steps — why not?
Just one set
of stairs
without a
chain stretched
across the
top step.
Just one door
calling
out to you,
Come in!
dec 1: there are certain stretches I don’t remember running through — like the part of the walking trail that separates from the bike path right before the trestle. Why can’t I picture it?
stretches of
the path
forgotten
moments
I enter
a space
outside of
myself.
dec 3: running by a house I walk by often, seeing the door looking different — a new color? orange? have they painted their house or is the light just weird for me today?
today the
color
of this door
has changed —
a new paint
job or
a trick of
the light?
dec 5: a path winding through the savanna revealed by settled snow
a path winds
through the
savanna
often
invisible
today
revealed by
new snow
dec 6: wet path, shimmering — is it just water, or is it super slick ice?
Here, two doors,
both
possible.
One’s safe
the other
more fun.
note: As I write these, I’m thinking that part of their point is to open up and to get into the habit of converting things noticed into my form. Many of them aren’t great, but they are good practice and could help to loosen me up. For the first time in a few years, ran to Lake Nokomis and back.
dec 15: kids laughing on a playground* (*as I listened to the kids, I thought about how this sound doesn’t really change. Over the years, it comes from different kids, but the sound is the same. Season after season, year after year.)
no matter
the year
recess sounds
the same
the difference
is you
and how you
hear it
dec 18: hot sun on my face, once or twice
hot sun on
my face
I pretend
spring’s door
has opened
dec 19: as I ran south, some white thing out of the corner of my eye kept calling out, notice me! So I did: it was an arch of the lake street bridge
Sometimes doors
don’t speak
and sometimes
they scream
Open me,
enter!
dec 22: halfway down the hill, I noticed some stairs on the other side of the road I’ve never noticed before. Were they leading to the franklin terrace dog park?
halfway down
the hill
surprise stairs
noticed
just today.
Where do
they lead? What
doors do
they open?