Reason to believe?

Today’s posting will be very short and not so sweet. It’s been triggered by my listening to some folk songs from back when, especiallly one written and recorded by Tim Hardin. It focuses on this question:

Did Tim Hardin foresee the candidacy of Donald Trump and his following of MAGAts and tRumpsters?

Read these lyrics and I hope you’ll see the reasons for my question. Perhaps the campaign could try to turn it into a theme song.

Tim Hardin Lyrics

"Reason To Believe"

If I listened long enough to you

I'd find a way to believe that it's all true

Knowing that you lied straight faced while I cried

Still I look to find a reason to believe

Someone like you makes it hard to live

Without somebody else

Someone like you makes it easy to give

Never thinking of myself

If I gave you time to change my mind

I'd find a way to leave the past behind

Knowing that you lied straight faced while I cried

Still I look to find a reason to believe

If I listened long enough to you

I'd find a way to believe it's all true

Knowing that you lied straight faced while I cried

Still I look to find a reason to believe 

I can almost understand why some disenchanted voters supported a reported con man in 2016. Unless they're too embarrassed to admit how wrong they were, I can't comprehend why anyone would vote twice for the same loser.

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The music of poetry

Thanks to the Better Half, today I learned something new about one of my favorite singer/songwriters, Ani DiFranco: she’s also a published poet and author. Somehow, I had missed that, probably because I usually search either for music or for poetry/writing but rarely for both at the same time. The Better Half bought DiFranco’s The Knowing for our granddaughter’s upcoming birthday. As I was checking online reviews, I came across a reference to DiFranco’s poetry and went looking specifically for that (Verses) and then came across No Walls and the Recurring Dream: A Memoir. Interestingly, her book of poetry isn’t listed on the “books” page of her web site. Since I currently am in possession of two plus shelves of (indirectly inherited) unread poetry volumes, I’m a little hesitant to add Ms. DiFranco’s just yet, but I expect to get the unread down to a point where I can add to the stacks. Then, a copy of Verses may well show up. May such be my biggest problem for the next several months.

poetry complements music complements poetry

Photo by J. Harrington

Summer has returned in the form of a warm (80℉), sunny afternoon. It’s not helping our drought, but neither is it unseasonable. There’s a chance of a little rain tonight and tomorrow, so we’ll cross our fingers and hope for the best. There’s still six weeks of autumn community supported agriculture [CSA] shares to look forward to, beginning tomorrow. Our share box is reported to contain:

• SPAGHETTI SQUASH
• CARAFLEX CABBAGE
• GREEN ONION
• FRENCH BREAKFAST RADISH
• CHERRY TOMATOES
• BROCCOLI, and
• BRIGHT LIGHTS CHARD

Once again the Better Half will rise to the occasions (yes, plural) and turn things I’d normally try to avoid consuming into something I find at least palatable. If I didn’t think we needed more and stronger local food systems (residual affinity from my folkies and hippies days), we wouldn’t purchase CSA shares each year and I wouldn’t be faced with the prospect of eating so many fresh veggies. It’s all living proof of the old saying “No good deed shall go unpunished.” 

The Weary Blues

Langston Hughes     1901 – 1967

Droning a drowsy syncopated tune,
Rocking back and forth to a mellow croon,
     I heard a Negro play.
Down on Lenox Avenue the other night
By the pale dull pallor of an old gas light
     He did a lazy sway . . .
     He did a lazy sway . . .
To the tune o’ those Weary Blues.
With his ebony hands on each ivory key
He made that poor piano moan with melody.
     O Blues!
Swaying to and fro on his rickety stool
He played that sad raggy tune like a musical fool.
     Sweet Blues!
Coming from a black man’s soul.
     O Blues!
In a deep song voice with a melancholy tone
I heard that Negro sing, that old piano moan—
     "Ain’t got nobody in all this world,
       Ain’t got nobody but ma self.
       I’s gwine to quit ma frownin’
       And put ma troubles on the shelf."

Thump, thump, thump, went his foot on the floor.
He played a few chords then he sang some more—
     "I got the Weary Blues
       And I can’t be satisfied.
       Got the Weary Blues
       And can’t be satisfied—
       I ain’t happy no mo’
       And I wish that I had died."
And far into the night he crooned that tune.
The stars went out and so did the moon.
The singer stopped playing and went to bed
While the Weary Blues echoed through his head.
He slept like a rock or a man that's dead.

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After May, 'tis time to mow... #phenology

Early this morning, while rehanging the bird feeders, I stepped over a June bug that was walking/crawling across the deck. Mid-day, while walking SiSi the rescue dog, we noticed the first beardtongue in bloom. Several places in our fields now have yellow hawkweed in bloom. We noticed them while doing the year's first mowing of the back yard yesterday and today. Whether the yellow flowers are an invasive species or a native one isn't clear, but our fingers are crossed that our plants are the narrow-leaf hawkweed, a native species, unless, of course, they're Crepis tectorum, narrow-leaf hawksbeard. Lawyers sometimes refer to "a distinction without a difference." Is that what we have here?

is this narrow-leaf hawkweed? hawksbeard?

Photo by J. Harrington

In case you also are challenged trying to properly identify certain wild plants, let me note that distinctions are also becoming blurred in literature: is memoir fiction or non-fiction or both?; and music: first Dylan is awarded the Nobel Prize in literature, and then Baez, long the Queen of Folk, is inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Then there's one of my favorite genres or forms, prose poetry. Of course, in a universe where an unmitigated charlatan can become president of the United States, we must be ready to expect almost anything. Is it even possible that the United States government might admit UFOs could be real?

The Confuscianist in me finds much of this quite distressing. The Taoist in me notes that "The name that can be named is not the eternal name." Thus the times, and the names, have always been changing, haven't they? 

The Times They Are A-Changin’

Written by: Bob Dylan 

Come gather ’round people
Wherever you roam
And admit that the waters
Around you have grown
And accept it that soon
You’ll be drenched to the bone
If your time to you is worth savin’
Then you better start swimmin’ or you’ll sink like a stone
For the times they are a-changin’

Come writers and critics
Who prophesize with your pen
And keep your eyes wide
The chance won’t come again
And don’t speak too soon
For the wheel’s still in spin
And there’s no tellin’ who that it’s namin’
For the loser now will be later to win
For the times they are a-changin’

Come senators, congressmen
Please heed the call
Don’t stand in the doorway
Don’t block up the hall
For he that gets hurt
Will be he who has stalled
There’s a battle outside and it is ragin’
It’ll soon shake your windows and rattle your walls
For the times they are a-changin’

Come mothers and fathers
Throughout the land
And don’t criticize
What you can’t understand
Your sons and your daughters
Are beyond your command
Your old road is rapidly agin’
Please get out of the new one if you can’t lend your hand
For the times they are a-changin’

The line it is drawn
The curse it is cast
The slow one now
Will later be fast
As the present now
Will later be past
The order is rapidly fadin’
And the first one now will later be last
For the times they are a-changin’

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Urge for going

After dutifully changing the oil and filter in the tractor this morning, we're listening to the second CD in the Joni Mitchell Archives - Volume 1, the early years (1963 - 1967). It includes two versions of the Urge for Going. Listening to a composer performer her works in different ways, showing the development and growth of talent, is a real treat. As much as anything, we're blown away by her guitar playing, enough so we finally looked up what the hell an "open G tuning" is. We suppose now we'll have to see what that sounds like on our long neglected guitar.

we read much more than we practice guitar

Photo by J. Harrington

The fact that we avoided disasters during the oil change was one of this week's other treats. Yesterday's delivery of a box of books from England, a package we weren't expecting until near the end of the month, is another one. This is shaping up as one of the better weeks in quite awhile around here. That brings us right back to the Urge for going.

Today's high temperature is forecast to reach 78℉. All week we've enjoy temperatures about 30℉ warmer than normal for this time of year. Next Tuesday, four days away, the high is forecast to be in the low 40's, accompanied by snow. Weather whiplash is on the way again. We've already had a week of freezing and snow late last month. This morning we saw a hornet for the first time in weeks. Local ponds that had frozen over are now, again, all open water. Firearms deer season opens tomorrow without a trace of tracking snow in the local woods.

geese, no chevron, with an urge for going

Photo by J. Harrington

[UPDATE: Bumblebees are going extinct in a time of ‘climate chaos’]

Farmers have used this week's weather respite to harvest more fields that hadn't been touched prior to the cold, snow and freezing spell. Some waterfowl are still hanging around but, we suspect that, come next week, they'll have an urge for going. Weather volatility, political volatility, public health volatility, they all, individually or collectively, may leave many of us one day next week facing something like this:

Urge For Going

by Joni Mitchell

I awoke today and found 
the frost perched on the town
It hovered in a frozen sky 
then it gobbled summer down
When the sun turns traitor cold 
and all the trees are shivering in a naked row...

I get the urge for going
But I never seem to go

I get the urge for going
When the meadow grass is turning brown
And summertime is falling down and winter is closing in

I had a man in summertime
He had summer-colored skin
And not another girl in town
My darling's heart could win
But when the leaves fell on the ground
And bully winds came around
and pushed them face down in the snow...
He got the urge for going
And I had to let him go

He got the urge for going
When the meadow grass was turning brown
And summertime was falling down and winter was closing in

Now the warriors of winter give a cold triumphant shout
And all that stays is dying all that lives is gettin' out
See the geese in chevron flight 
Flapping and racing on before the snow...
They've got the urge for going
And they've got the wings to go

They get the urge for going
When the meadow grass is turning brown
And summertime is falling down and winter is closing in

I'll ply the fire with kindling now
I'll pull the blankets up to my chin
I'll lock the vagrant winter out
And I'll bolt my wandering in
I'd like to call back summertime
And have her stay for just another month or so...
But she's got the urge for going
So I guess she'll have to go

She gets the urge for going
When the meadow grass is turning brown
And all her empire's falling down
And winter's closing in.

And I get the urge for going
When the meadow grass is turning brown
And summertime is Falling Down.

This lyric has been formatted exactly as Joni preferred it to appear (capitalization, punctuation, line breaks, changes in wording, etc). Joni collaborated with Lisa and John Sornberger by making these changes for presentation in their book, Gathered Light.

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May this be an election day we can celebrate later

It's almost 70℉ outside. As I stepped outside to empty some recycling my first thoughts were "we'll pay for this." That made me realize I'm almost a naturalized Minnesotan. Then it occurred to me, maybe we already have paid for this, with  the snow and the cold that's but recently moved on. Since I sincerely and deeply believe we'll see more snow before we reach next Spring, the morning was spent getting the snowblower running and changing its oil. Missions accomplished and with not a bit of frostbite. Keeping busy with time-consuming and irritating chores is a good way to keep from fretting about what's going on at the polls today.

we already paid for today's weather in late October

Photo by J. Harrington

I gave myself some early Christmas presents again this year. They both arrived yesterday, earlier than the package-tracking app had me anticipating. Over the years I've become a serious Joni Mitchell fan. Many of her songs are among my all-time favorites and she and I are about the same age so many of her songs are also included in the soundtrack of my life. I'm now the quite pleased owner of her book Morning Glory on the Vine, early songs and drawings and her recently released package of 5 CDs and a booklet, Joni Mitchell Archives – Vol.1: The Early Years (1963-1967). The early arrival is a more than fortuitous event since I've decided, if I don't like how the election turns out, to revert not to a second childhood but to a second (or third or fourth) young adulthood. Maybe I'd be happier if I decided to spend my remaining time as a folkie-hippie type. It's possible, even probable, that I drifted away prematurely form those threads as I aged. Come to think of it, becoming a grown up was never one of my major aspirations.

It's been a treat to listen to some of the earliest Joni, when she was still Anderson, singing traditional folk songs on the first CD. Tomorrow we'll listen to some of her initial recordings of some of her own work, like Urge for Going and Circle Game and several others I don't think I've ever heard. Her version of Molly Malone definitely triggered a flashback to my younger days and family gatherings on the Irish side of the family. My fingers are crossed that we have the luck o' the Irish at the polls and end up today with more to look forward to than back on.

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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Just plain folks

I have been a folk music fan for just about all of my adult life. As a teenager, my dedication was split between rock and  roll and folk music, with rock taking a slight edge in my younger days. As I slowly revert in the direction of my past version of a "back to the land" self, I'm increasingly frustrated by things like getting 100 radio stations on my Jeep's trial version of SIRIUS, only one of which was folk music and that from Canada as I remember. I've not yet sorted out if it's possible to somehow listen to the internet station Folk Alley while driving. The local fm HD folk station keeps dropping out of range in my neighborhood and, the other day, while I was in "The Cities." That should help set up my absolute glee when I discovered that Rhiannon Giddens, one of my favorite contemporary folkies, recently delivered the Folk Alliance 2020 keynote speech and made it available on Facebook (a platform I usually stay away from and condemn as being basically evil). I commend it most highly to your attention. It's an awesome read and  I wish I had been there to see her  deliver it. It also fits wonderfully with Black History Month. There's a YouTube segment available where she performs Richie Havens' "Freedom," which is near the culmination of her keynote.

October 2016, Joan Baez, an original "folkie"

Photo by J. Harrington

With the effects of our broken climate increasing, as is the need to minimize or eliminate our contribution of greenhouse gases, adapt to a broken climate, and drawdown some of the GHGs we've already emitted, I'm seeing more and more folks promoting actions similar to those taken by the "back to the landers" in the late 1960s and early 1970s. When (not if) we're successful increasing the scale of restorative agriculture, diminishing the scale of commodity agriculture and concentrated animal feeding operations, and better developing our bioregional economies, will we have proven the hippies were right and we should have paid more attention a couple of generations ago? If you wonder how we can restore and revivify small towns and cities and real family farms at a human scale, take a look at Dar Williams' What I Found in a Thousand Towns. Give a listen to her music too, if you haven't yet.

local community supported agriculture rutabagas

Photo by J. Harrington

It's not quite in line with the plot of "Back to the Future," but as I recall, the hippies, folkies and back to the landers managed to have quite a bit of fun while rockers were busy harassing each other and trying to actively overthrow a system. Maybe this time around Victor Hugo's assessment may be timely: "There Is Nothing So Powerful As An Idea Whose Time Has Come."

New Folk

By Terrance Hayes

I said Folk was dressed in Blues but hairier and hemped.

After "We acoustic banjo disciples!" Jebediah said, "When

and whereforth shall the bucolic blacks with good tempers

come to see us pluck as Elizabeth Cotton intended?"

We stole my Uncle Windchime's minivan, penned a simple   

ballad about the drag of lovelessness and drove the end

of the chitlin' circuit to a joint skinny as a walk-in temple

where our new folk was not that new, but strengthened

by our twelve bar conviction. A month later, in pulled

a parade of well meaning alabaster post adolescents.

We noticed the sand-tanned and braless ones piled

in the ladder-backed front row with their boyfriends

first because beneath our twangor slept what I'll call

a hunger for the outlawable. One night J asked me when

sisters like Chapman would arrive. I shook my chin wool

then, and placed my hand over the guitar string's wind-

ow til it stilled. "When the moon's black," I said. "Be faithful."

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Today is Lughnasadh

We have, from time to time, happily referred to our being "of Irish extraction." That being the case, we're please to announce that today, astrologically speaking, is the feast of:

Lughnasadh or Lammas (Luh guh' nahs eye or Loo nas saw)

• Traditional date: August 1
• Actual astrological date: August 7 in 2019
• Midpoint between Summer Solstice and the Autumn Equinox
• Fourth Gaelic Fire Festival (female)
• Celtic Lughnasadh means "Lugh's assembly", the god Lugh celebrated a funeral feast for his foster-mother, Tailtiu
• Modern Gaelic Lughnasadh means "August"
• First harvest festival
• Celebrates the beginning of harvest season, the decline of summer to winter
• Time of dismiss regrets, farewells, perparation for winter
• Ceremonies involve breads, grains and harvest corn dolls
• Colours: Oranges, greens, browns
  

What we like to do:

• We bring out the first of the fall decorations, make bread that is shared with our family and friends,
• candles are lit on each night with a prayer for thanks for the first harvest.

Today we're wearing a green henley shirt; we've baked a loaf of bread that we'll share with the family; and, tonight we'll be sure to light candles at our evening meal. Even the monarch caterpillar / butterflies share the colors with their green chrysalis becoming a predominantly orange butterfly. It was about this time of the month that the monarch emerged last year. We'll share more of those pictures again one day very soon.

In August is a monarch chrysalis green in honor of Lughnasadh?

Photo by J. Harrington

A nearby farmer finished harvesting several fields of small grain, we're not sure which kind, a couple of weeks ago and just last week cut and baled the straw. We find it reassuring that August can share overlapping activities on both sides of "the pond," although we're still working on how it is that Summer Solstice is referred to as "midsummer" rather than the beginning. We think it may have to do with splitting the year in half rather than in quarters, but haven't become comfortable with that rationale just yet.

Tonight is the First Quarter moon, with the Sturgeon Moon falling a week from tomorrow. It seems an august time of year worth celebrating, or not?

August Morning

By Albert Garcia

It’s ripe, the melon 

by our sink. Yellow, 

bee-bitten, soft, it perfumes 

the house too sweetly. 

At five I wake, the air 

mournful in its quiet. 

My wife’s eyes swim calmly 

under their lids, her mouth and jaw 

relaxed, different. 

What is happening in the silence 

of this house? Curtains 

hang heavily from their rods. 

Ficus leaves tremble 

at my footsteps. Yet 

the colors outside are perfect-- 

orange geranium, blue lobelia. 

I wander from room to room 

like a man in a museum: 

wife, children, books, flowers, 

melon. Such still air. Soon 

the mid-morning breeze will float in 

like tepid water, then hot. 

How do I start this day, 

I who am unsure 

of how my life has happened 

or how to proceed 

amid this warm and steady sweetness?

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Jeers to triathletes, Cheers for artisans

This weekend, particularly Sunday the 28th, might be a good time to avoid much of Southern Chisago County, unless you don't mind being delayed by a bunch of triathlon participants clogging many of the roads, including a Highway 95 crossing. Here's a link to the event's web site if you want the gory details.

a local road but not on the route, we hope

Photo by J. Harrington

Several years ago part of one of the courses included a stretch of our road. We weren't particularly pleased about that. Hindering the travels of local folks and ordinary visitors to accommodate triathlon participants aggravates us old curmudgeons. We don't object to the use of the roads, but to the way the local constabulary too often holds vehicular traffic at intersections to permit triathletes to move freely. And, probably even more curmudgeonly, we really don't give a damn if the event does benefit local businesses.

our homemade artisan sourdough bread

Photo by J. Harrington

On a more cheerful note, we call to your attention to a new addition in our listing of local artisans with whom we've done business [right han column, top]. The Marine Mills Folk School keeps offering more and more classes, several of which we find to be of greater than passing interest. Plus, we're quite grateful that we don't have to head for one of our favorite, but very distant, places in Minnesota, Grand Marais, to enjoy learning artisanal skills and practices. We invited the Daughter Person to join us for a sourdough class earlier this year. The Better Half has taken, we believe, a couple of classes in weaving and felting. We're pleased that the good folks that started the Folk School did so and that they seem to be having a decent degree of success. Lifelong learning is something to which we think everyone should aspire. And, the addition of a Folk School to our extended neighborhood provides one more thing about which we can express gratitude for living where we do.

A Shropshire Lad 19: The time you won your town the race

By A. E. Housman

The time you won your town the race 

We chaired you through the market-place; 

Man and boy stood cheering by, 

And home we brought you shoulder-high. 

To-day, the road all runners come, 

Shoulder-high we bring you home, 

And set you at your threshold down, 

Townsman of a stiller town. 

Smart lad, to slip betimes away 

From fields where glory does not stay 

And early though the laurel grows 

It withers quicker than the rose. 

Eyes the shady night has shut 

Cannot see the record cut, 

And silence sounds no worse than cheers 

After earth has stopped the ears: 

Now you will not swell the rout 

Of lads that wore their honours out, 

Runners whom renown outran 

And the name died before the man. 

So set, before its echoes fade, 

The fleet foot on the sill of shade, 

And hold to the low lintel up 

The still-defended challenge-cup. 

And round that early-laurelled head 

Will flock to gaze the strengthless dead, 

And find unwithered on its curls 

The garland briefer than a girl's.

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Beltane? May Day? or mayday?

Happy May Day from the North Country. We can tell it's May 1st by the mid-day temperature of 41℉. Some of us believe that makes it more than one kind of Mayday! It would most likely be even more frustrating and disheartening if we were celebrating the feast of Beltane, the start of druid Summer. For that matter, with the local temperatures we're enjoying, celebrating today with a fire festival has lots of appeal. Unfortunately, about half of Minnesota is under burning restrictions, so no Beltane fires for us.

in May, the yaks come back

Photo by J. Harrington

That's probably just as well for one of the neighbors. They've a small herd of yaks that they pasture nearby during the warmer months. We noticed them this morning as we drove past. Given the length of yak hair(?) - fur(?), it might be dangerous for the animals to drive them between Beltane fires to purify them.

May is the month for turtle travel

Photo by J. Harrington

If the weather isn't too far out of whack, May should be the month for wild flowers and turtles. At least, May is the month when we have the most pictures of wild flowers and turtles. Another contender this May might be sandhill cranes. Several just flew, trumpeting, over the house. We were standing on the deck with both dogs, surveying the status of things in our domain, when crane calls from directly overhead, and not very high, startled the dickens out of all three of us. May could turn out to be more exciting than we've been anticipating. Stay tuned!

Turtle

By Kay Ryan

Who would be a turtle who could help it?

A barely mobile hard roll, a four-oared helmet,

she can ill afford the chances she must take

in rowing toward the grasses that she eats.

Her track is graceless, like dragging

a packing-case places, and almost any slope

defeats her modest hopes. Even being practical,

she's often stuck up to the axle on her way

to something edible. With everything optimal,

she skirts the ditch which would convert

her shell into a serving dish. She lives

below luck-level, never imagining some lottery

will change her load of pottery to wings.

Her only levity is patience,

the sport of truly chastened things.

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Crafty folks

One of our favorite destinations in Northern Minnesota is Grand Marais. Years ago we were almost involved in a project there and that's how we came to know a little about the place. We have, from time to time, lusted after some of the courses offered at the North House Folk School. (Although we recognized that aluminum and fiberglass are more practical, we've long had a soft spot in our hearts for wooden boats.) Grand Marais doesn't come close to any definition of local we're comfortable with so we were delighted to learn that a folk school has started offering courses much nearer to us.

Grand Marais harbor

Photo by J. Harrington

The Marine Mills Folk School started offering classes just last year. We're actually considering taking one or two ourselves. If we do, you'll get to read about it here. In fact, the Better Half is at a weaving class today. Since part of the purpose of the school is to "build community," and Marine on St. Croix is focused on one of our favorite parts of Minnesota, maybe we'll meet some local folks who share some of our interests. Years ago the Franconia Sculpture Park organized a book club focused on the arts. We enjoyed participating but the facilitator departed for other opportunities and not one picked up that baton. One of the issues with building community in rural parts of Minnesota in the Winter is that travel can range from difficult to dangerous. Speaking of which, we hope that we have seen the last of below zero temperatures and wind chills this year. Any bets on that?

Marine general store

Photo by J. Harrington

The Weavers

Linda Gregerson, 1950

As sometimes, in the gentler months, the sun
will return
                            before the rain has altogether
                                                       stopped and through
this lightest of curtains the curve of it shines
with a thousand
                           inclinations and so close
                                                      is the one to the
one adjacent that you cannot tell where magenta
for instance begins
                          and where the all-but-magenta
                                                      has ended and yet
you’d never mistake the blues for red, so these two,
the girl and the
                          goddess, with their earth-bred, grassfed,
                                                      kettle-dyed
wools, devised on their looms
transitions so subtle no
                          hand could trace nor eye discern
                                                      their increments,
yet the stories they told were perfectly clear.
The gods in their heaven,
                          the one proposed. The gods in
                                                      heat, said the other.
And ludicrous too, with their pinions and swansdown,
fins and hooves,
                          their shepherds’ crooks and pizzles.
                                                      Till mingling
with their darlings-for-a-day they made
a progeny so motley it
                          defied all sorting-out.
                                                      It wasn’t the boasting
brought Arachne all her sorrow
nor even
                          the knowing her craft so well.
                                                      Once true
and twice attested.
It was simply the logic she’d already
                          taught us how
                                                      to read.

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Please be kind to each other while you can.