Welcome, February!

Yesterday was the Feast of Imbolc. It was also the first day of Black History Month. Today, on Groundhog Day, Punxsutawney Phil is reported to have seen his shadow, which means six weeks more of winter. That brings us to mid-March, several weeks after the March 1 beginning of meteorological spring and about a week before the spring equinox, the start of astronomical spring. However, according to NOAA, Phil has a history of not being very accurate with his forecasts.

If you’re reading this, it’s a good indication you made it through January with us. This morning, for the first time this year, I heard the spring song of a chickadee. The little snow we got yesterday and last night is melting. More flakes are forecast for tonight and tomorrow morning, followed by daytime highs in the upper teens and low twenties for at least a week or so. Normal highs this week should be in the mid-twenties, so Phil looks to be on target for the first week of February.

Valentine's Day hearts and candy

Photo by J. Harrington

Valentine’s Day will be a week from Friday. Last night we helped the Daughter Person and Son-In-Law, and many of their friends, celebrate the 20th anniversary of their first date. Several of the folks whose blogs I follow are focusing this month on the need to love the world and all our neighbors, both human and more than. I find that I can love much of the world but have severe difficulty with creatures like viruses that make folks sick or worse. I have similar issues with many people who seem to have been placed here primarily to cause suffering and/or serve as a bad example. Neither do I believe in unilateral disarmament. I suspect sainthood isn’t in my future.

In light of events of the past couple of weeks, and those anticipated for the foreseeable future, I can think of no better way to begin celebrating Black History Month than with this poem of Langston Hughes:

Let America Be America Again 

by Langston Hughes 

Let America be America again.
Let it be the dream it used to be.
Let it be the pioneer on the plain
Seeking a home where he himself is free.

(America never was America to me.)

Let America be the dream the dreamers dreamed--
Let it be that great strong land of love
Where never kings connive nor tyrants scheme
That any man be crushed by one above.

(It never was America to me.)

O, let my land be a land where Liberty
Is crowned with no false patriotic wreath,
But opportunity is real, and life is free,
Equality is in the air we breathe.

(There's never been equality for me,
Nor freedom in this "homeland of the free.")

Say, who are you that mumbles in the dark?
And who are you that draws your veil across the stars?

I am the poor white, fooled and pushed apart,
I am the Negro bearing slavery's scars.
I am the red man driven from the land,
I am the immigrant clutching the hope I seek--
And finding only the same old stupid plan
Of dog eat dog, of mighty crush the weak.

I am the young man, full of strength and hope,
Tangled in that ancient endless chain
Of profit, power, gain, of grab the land!
Of grab the gold! Of grab the ways of satisfying need!
Of work the men! Of take the pay!
Of owning everything for one's own greed!

I am the farmer, bondsman to the soil.
I am the worker sold to the machine.
I am the Negro, servant to you all.
I am the people, humble, hungry, mean--
Hungry yet today despite the dream.
Beaten yet today--O, Pioneers!
I am the man who never got ahead,
The poorest worker bartered through the years.

Yet I'm the one who dreamt our basic dream
In the Old World while still a serf of kings,
Who dreamt a dream so strong, so brave, so true,
That even yet its mighty daring sings
In every brick and stone, in every furrow turned
That's made America the land it has become.
O, I'm the man who sailed those early seas
In search of what I meant to be my home--
For I'm the one who left dark Ireland's shore,
And Poland's plain, and England's grassy lea,
And torn from Black Africa's strand I came
To build a "homeland of the free."

The free?

Who said the free? Not me?
Surely not me? The millions on relief today?
The millions shot down when we strike?
The millions who have nothing for our pay?
For all the dreams we've dreamed
And all the songs we've sung
And all the hopes we've held
And all the flags we've hung,
The millions who have nothing for our pay--
Except the dream that's almost dead today.

O, let America be America again--
The land that never has been yet--
And yet must be--the land where every man is free.
The land that's mine--the poor man's, Indian's, Negro's, ME--
Who made America,
Whose sweat and blood, whose faith and pain,
Whose hand at the foundry, whose plow in the rain,
Must bring back our mighty dream again.

Sure, call me any ugly name you choose--
The steel of freedom does not stain.
From those who live like leeches on the people's lives,
We must take back our land again,
America!

O, yes,
I say it plain,
America never was America to me,
And yet I swear this oath--
America will be!

Out of the rack and ruin of our gangster death,
The rape and rot of graft, and stealth, and lies,
We, the people, must redeem
The land, the mines, the plants, the rivers.
The mountains and the endless plain--
All, all the stretch of these great green states--
And make America again!

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Thanks for visiting. Come again when you can.
Please be kind to each other while you can.

💖 Happy Valentine’s Day ❗💚💝

sweets for our sweeties

Photo by J. Harrington

As you go about your day, and the  rest of your life, think about today’s poem. What are we missing? Who and what waits to be found? Are we paying attention enough?

Love at First Sight

Wislawa Szymborska - 1923-2012

They’re both convinced
that a sudden passion joined them.
Such certainty is beautiful,
but uncertainty is more beautiful still.

Since they’d never met before, they’re sure
that there’d been nothing between them.
But what’s the word from the streets, staircases, hallways—
perhaps they’ve passed by each other a million times?

I want to ask them
if they don’t remember—
a moment face to face
in some revolving door?
perhaps a “sorry” muttered in a crowd?
a curt “wrong number” caught in the receiver?—
but I know the answer.
No, they don’t remember.

They’d be amazed to hear
that Chance has been toying with them
now for years.

Not quite ready yet
to become their Destiny,
it pushed them close, drove them apart,
it barred their path,
stifling a laugh,
and then leaped aside.

There were signs and signals,
even if they couldn’t read them yet.
Perhaps three years ago
or just last Tuesday
a certain leaf fluttered
from one shoulder to another?
Something was dropped and then picked up.
Who knows, maybe the ball that vanished
into childhood’s thicket?

There were doorknobs and doorbells
where one touch had covered another
beforehand.
Suitcases checked and standing side by side.
One night, perhaps, the same dream,
grown hazy by morning.

Every beginning
is only a sequel, after all,
and the book of events
is always open halfway through.

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On Valentine’s Day

The township showed its love for us by plowing clear last night’s snow at about 4 this morning. The Better Half and I exchanged Valentines (surprisingly complimentary) during our first cups of coffee.

An almost full moon peeked through a cloud-scudded sky. Snow crunched and squeaked underfoot as we walked the dogs in the dark before dawn. Tomorrow’s high temperature is forecast to be near twice today’s. That’s almost heart-warming. Real spring flowers would be even better. They’ll come in time.

Happy Valentine’s Day

Photo by J. Harrington

My reading of Nikki Giovanni’s poem sees interwoven themes we need more of in these times: love of and for Earth, another, and one’s own self. May those fill today, and the balance of your life, with warmth and love.

Resignation

Nikki Giovanni - 1943-

I love you
            because the Earth turns round the sun
            because the North wind blows north
                 sometimes
            because the Pope is Catholic
                 and most Rabbis Jewish
            because the winters flow into springs
                 and the air clears after a storm
            because only my love for you
                 despite the charms of gravity
                 keeps me from falling off this Earth
                 into another dimension
I love you
            because it is the natural order of things

I love you
            like the habit I picked up in college
                 of sleeping through lectures
                 or saying I’m sorry
                 when I get stopped for speeding
            because I drink a glass of water
                 in the morning
                 and chain-smoke cigarettes
                 all through the day
            because I take my coffee Black
                 and my milk with chocolate
            because you keep my feet warm
                 though my life a mess
I love you
            because I don’t want it
                 any other way

I am helpless
            in my love for you
It makes me so happy
            to hear you call my name
I am amazed you can resist
            locking me in an echo chamber
            where your voice reverberates
            through the four walls
            sending me into spasmatic ecstasy
I love you
            because it’s been so good
            for so long
            that if I didn’t love you
            I’d have to be born again
            and that is not a theological statement
I am pitiful in my love for you

The Dells tell me Love
            is so simple
            the thought though of you
            sends indescribably delicious multitudinous
            thrills throughout and through-in my body
I love you
            because no two snowflakes are alike
            and it is possible
            if you stand tippy-toe
            to walk between the raindrops
I love you
            because I am afraid of the dark
                 and can’t sleep in the light
            because I rub my eyes
                 when I wake up in the morning
                 and find you there
            because you with all your magic powers were
                 determined that
I should love you
            because there was nothing for you but that
I would love you

I love you
            because you made me
                 want to love you
            more than I love my privacy
                 my freedom          my commitments
                      and responsibilities
I love you ’cause I changed my life
            to love you
            because you saw me one Friday
                 afternoon and decided that I would
love you
I love you I love you I love you

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Thanks for visiting. Come again when you can.
Please be kind to each other while you can.

Valentine's minus 4

Red, in different shades, is the color for Valentine’s Day. That means on or before the fourteenth of this month we’ll start looking at the local clusters of dogwood to see if the colors of their stems have brightened yet. I bet we can find a few more vases and places to set them if we collect some dogwood stems to help brighten the rooms and hasten the feeling of spring’s arrival.

red osier dogwood in February

Photo by J. Harrington

Red, again in different shades for arteries (bright) or veins (dark), is a color that comes into view or to mind all too often in Claudia Rankine’s Citizen: An American Lyric.

Citizen came out in October 2014. In the first printing, according to a Graywolf publicist, Page 134 read:

November 23, 2012 / In Memory of Jordan Russell Davis  

That was the date the black 17-year-old was gunned down in Jacksonville, Florida.

The next page, 135, was headed:

February 15, 2014 / The Justice System

That was the date the prosecution of Davis’ shooter, Michael Dunn, ended in a mistrial. (Dunn was later convicted, in October, of first-degree murder.)

But for the second printing, which went to press on Sept. 24, 2014, Rankine chose to add another name to Page 134’s written monument—that of Ferguson’s Michael Brown. The new edition read:

November 23, 2012 / In Memory of Jordan Russell Davis

August 9, 2014 / In Memory of Michael Brown

Now, the third printing, from Nov. 20, 2014, shows the most powerful change yet. The phrase “In Memory Of” repeats down the side of Page 134, with the names of victims arrayed to the right: Jordan Russell Davis, Eric Garner, John Crawford, and Michael Brown. Blank spaces next to the remaining “In Memories” suggest that more black men will eventually join the ranks of those already fallen.

As we approach Valentine’s Day almost a decade after the third printing, it’s more than disheartening to think how much longer, with how many more names, could be added to pages 134 and following. [My copy of Citizen has a list that stops at the name Sandra Bland, “a 28-year-old African-American woman who was found hanged in a jail cell in Waller County, Texas, on July 13, 2015, three days after being arrested during a traffic stop.”]

I’d love to listen to, or read a transcript of, a conversation between Amanda Gorman, talking about Call Us What We Carry and Claudia Rankine, discussing Citizen and whether the former contradicts or complements the latter.

To return to a Valentine’s theme, “Only love can break a heart, only love can mend it again.”

from Citizen, VI [I knew whatever was in front of me was happening]

Claudia Rankine

I knew whatever was in front of me was happening and then the police vehicle came to a screeching halt in front of me like they were setting up a blockade. Everywhere were flashes, a siren sounding and a stretched-out roar. Get on the ground. Get on the ground now. Then I just knew.

And you are not the guy and still you fit the description because there is only one guy who is always the guy fitting the description.

 

I left my client's house knowing I would be pulled over. I knew. I just knew. I opened my briefcase on the passenger seat, just so they could see. Yes officer rolled around on my tongue, which grew out of a bell that could never ring because its emergency was a tolling I was meant to swallow.

In a landscape drawn from an ocean bed, you can't drive yourself sane—so angry you are crying. You can't drive yourself sane. This motion wears a guy out. Our motion is wearing you out and still you are not that guy.

 

//

 

Then flashes, a siren, a stretched-out roar—and you are not the guy and still you fit the description because there is only one guy who is always the guy fitting the description.

Get on the ground. Get on the ground now. I must have been speeding. No, you weren't speeding. I wasn't speeding? You didn't do anything wrong. Then why are you pulling me over? Why am I pulled over? Put your hands where they can be seen. Put your hands in the air. Put your hands up.

Then you are stretched out on the hood. Then cuffed. Get on the ground now.

 

//

 

Each time it begins in the same way, it doesn't begin the same way, each time it begins it's the same. Flashes, a siren, the stretched-out roar—

Maybe because home was a hood the officer could not afford, not that a reason was needed, I was pulled out of my vehicle a block from my door, handcuffed and pushed into the police vehicle's backseat, the officer's knee pressing into my collarbone, the officer's warm breath vacating a face creased into the smile of its own private joke.

Each time it begins in the same way, it doesn't begin the same way, each time it begins it's the same.

Go ahead hit me motherfucker fled my lips and the officer did not need to hit me, the officer did not need anything from me except the look on my face on the drive across town. You can't drive yourself sane. You are not insane. Our motion is wearing you out. You are not the guy.

 

//

 

This is what it looks like. You know this is wrong. This is not what it looks like. You need to be quiet. This is wrong. You need to close your mouth now. This is what it looks like. Why are you talking if you haven't done anything wrong?

And you are not the guy and still you fit the description because there is only one guy who is always the guy fitting the description.

 

//

 

In a landscape drawn from an ocean bed, you can't drive yourself sane—so angry you can't drive yourself sane.

The charge the officer decided on was exhibition of speed. I was told, after the fingerprinting, to stand naked. I stood naked. It was only then I was instructed to dress, to leave, to walk all those miles back home.

And still you are not the guy and still you fit the description because there is only one guy who is always the guy fitting the description.

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Thanks for visiting. Come again when you can.
Please be kind to each other while you can.

Valentine's minus 5

As we get nearer Valentine’s Day in mid-February, more signs of spring are appearing. Yesterday, wild turkey tracks were found all along a stretch of the road bordering our property. The birds are getting active in anticipation of the upcoming breeding season while seeking previously untapped food supplies.

Meanwhile, more and more raptors are visible perched on the lamps along the local interstate. Signs those birds are heading north again?

Today’s weather feels much like mid-March, a hint of coming attractions, including thaws and melting.

"And our hearts, once all together beaten,
Now all together beat."

Photo by J. Harrington

Since February is not only the month of Valentine’s Day, but also Black History Month, today we’ll note we’re reading, and enjoying, Amanda Gorman’s recently published volume, Call Us What We Carry. A day or two ago we were particularly taken by the following lines from “Every Day We Are Learning":

Just like a skill or any art,
We cannot possess hope without practicing it.

A poem she recently released, that I don’t think is included in Call Us..., strikes me as being very much in alignment with the themes of Valentine’s Day. What do you think?

New Day's Lyric

by Amanda Gorman

May this be the day
We come together.
Mourning, we come to mend,
Withered, we come to weather,
Torn, we come to tend,
Battered, we come to better.
Tethered by this year of yearning,
We are learning
That though we weren’t ready for this,
We have been readied by it.
We steadily vow that no matter
How we are weighed down,
We must always pave a way forward.

This hope is our door, our portal.
Even if we never get back to normal,
Someday we can venture beyond it,
To leave the known and take the first steps.
So let us not return to what was normal,
But reach toward what is next.

What was cursed, we will cure.
What was plagued, we will prove pure.
Where we tend to argue, we will try to agree,
Those fortunes we forswore, now the future we foresee,
Where we weren’t aware, we’re now awake;
Those moments we missed
Are now these moments we make,
The moments we meet,
And our hearts, once all together beaten,
Now all together beat.

Come, look up with kindness yet,
For even solace can be sourced from sorrow.
We remember, not just for the sake of yesterday,
But to take on tomorrow.

We heed this old spirit,
In a new day’s lyric,
In our hearts, we hear it:
For auld lang syne, my dear,
For auld lang syne.
Be bold, sang Time this year,
Be bold, sang Time,
For when you honor yesterday,
Tomorrow ye will find.
Know what we’ve fought
Need not be forgot nor for none.
It defines us, binds us as one,
Come over, join this day just begun.
For wherever we come together,
We will forever overcome.

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Please be kind to each other while you can.

Valentine's minus 6

Signs of spring arrived yesterday, but they’re forced. A bunch (2 bundles) of forsythia stems arrived and have now been trimmed and placed in vases to bloom early.

forced forsythia with pussy willow stems

Photo by J. Harrington

Today, in honor of St. Patrick’s Day (mid-March), a package of Irish Soda Bread mix and a small bag of Irish flour arrived. We won’t be forcing the bread to bake early, although we might try an experiment with the flour before we get into March.

There’s at least one errand I’d like to finish in time to include it in the Valentine’s celebration, but our schedules have developed an unfortunate habit of getting disrupted over the past week or ten days. Meanwhile, we’ll just luxuriate in the brief warm spell we’re enjoying. It makes the prospect of real spring and warm weather seem like an actual possibility someday after Valentine’s and, probably, St. Patrick’s Days.

Next month we’ll be baking soda bread and enjoying a different bunch of blooming stems. For now we’ll munch our way through the Valentine’s candy centerpiece, going slowly enough that it will still appear respectable on the Fourteenth.

Forced Bloom

David Baker - 1954-

1.

Such pleasure one needs to make for oneself. 
She has snipped the paltry forsythia 
to force the bloom, has cut each stem on 
the slant and sprinkled brown sugar in a vase, 
so the wintered reeds will take their water. 
It hurts her to do this but she does it. 
When are we most ourselves, and when the least? 
Last night, the man in the recessed doorway, 
homeless or searching for something, or sought—
all he needed was one hand and quiet. 
The city around him was one small room. 
He leaned into the dark portal, gray 
shade in a door, a shadow of himself. 
His eyes were closed. His rhythm became him. 
So we have shut our eyes, as dead or as 
other, and held the thought of another 
whose pleasure is need, face over a face ... 

2. 

It hurts her to use her hands, to hold 
a cup or bud or touch a thing. The doctors 
have turned her burning hands in their hands. 
The tests have shown a problem, but no cause, 
a neuropathology of mere touch. 
We have all made love in the dark, small room 
of such need, without shame, to our comfort, 
our compulsion. I know I have. She has. 
We have held or helped each other, sometimes 
watching from the doorway of a warm house 
where candletips of new growth light the walls, 
the city in likeness beyond, our hands 
on the swollen damp branch or bud or cup. 
Sometimes we are most ourselves when we are 
least, or hurt, or lost, face over a face—. 
You have, too. It's your secret, your delight. 
You smell the wild scent all day on your hand. 

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Countdown to Valentine’s Day

One week from today we all, if we’re lucky, get to tell our loved ones how much we love them (and vice versa). It will also mean we’re halfway through February, which, I choose to believe, is Mother Nature’s way of telling me she loves me.

a Valentine centerpiece

Photo by J. Harrington

It probably doesn’t count as an early Valentine, despite the splash of bright red at the feeder, but the strategy we mentioned a week or so ago, of returning a tray feeder to service and see if that worked to entice cardinals back to the feeder, seems to be paying off. At least it did once, a couple of days ago, we had a male cardinal at the tray feeder in the middle of the afternoon.

As of this morning, we’ve officially entered our own version of the 2021 taxes season. I’ve got the income piece mostly organized. Tomorrow we’ll begin organizing the charitable deductions part. My target is to be able to deliver our completed tax organizer to our preparer on or around Valentine’s Day, as a way  of proving to myself how much I love me by getting it done and gone.

If You Feel Sorry 

By Ted Kooser

If you feel sorry for yourself
this Valentine's Day, think of
the dozens of little paper poppies
left in the box when the last
of the candy is gone, how they
must feel, dried out and brown
in their sad old heart-shaped box,
without so much as a single finger
to scrabble around in their
crinkled petals, not even
one pimpled nose to root and snort
through their delicate pot pourri.
So before you make too much
of being neglected, I want you
to think how they feel.

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Please be kind to each other while you can.