It was 99 degrees today and hard to keep up with the watering of plants and animals, and I always water myself in the yard when I water. I spray my neck and hair and even my face.
I washed the dog and all of her bedding dried on the line in about 10 minutes.
This morning I looked at the compost as I threw watermelon rind in it and a snake slipped out and over the grass, heading for the fence. I am the year of the snake so I try to recognize this animal, take closer notice. I think about hoeing carefully next time.
I cleaned up from the party last night.
Got a thank you this morning in the form of a cartoon.
It was closer to a salon. We all sat around on my recently returned family picnic table (another story) and told about where we came from and what we did. Then we shared whatever we wanted to. There was an original love poem, a journal entry, quotes about politics, more poems, and a poem I shared, not written by me.
It was one I found in my poetry magazine and I just liked it. I will post it at the end of this note.
After a couple hours, the light softened and a breeze came up. A few of us lingered. It was the after party party. We talked a little quieter, more intimately.
Speaking of interesting conversations, we had the media attend our last coffeehouse to conduct interviews! I will leave my audio here, I start talking at minute 17:00. We didn’t know the questions or have prepared answers so it was exciting and slightly harrowing.
Snippets of the poem I read, click the title to see the whole thing.
What Poetry Told Me by Adela Najarro
The week Poetry stayed at my house,
she kept a razor in a wooden box.
Her rhythm shattered glass, but she did not finish
what she began to carve into stone.
She was fickle.
First she drank mead, then preferred a martini.
Poetry wore a new necklace every day.
But she couldn’t really do anything. She never
made dinner or even brewed coffee.
She was horrible at baking.
Soon enough, Poetry abandoned everything,
left flour all over the counters.
On her way to the airport,
she texted one last entreaty,
something about an old oak tree
unfurling leaves, glossy and new
but with sharpened points
that can make a poet bleed.
