reporting

I am at the café up the road from the farmhouse. I’m reading about the life of a Russian poet who was exiled to America not too long ago. How difficult is it to write a short but excellent poem every day?

At the café, the barista – an earnest and kind young man who wont chase after you if one day you leave having forgotten to pay – is talking on the phone about the storms that destroyed homes and lives over and beyond what is normal for the Midwest. How could it be, how could it be...

I’m glad in writing small daily posts here, I do not have to report damage and destruction. Our storms yesterday evening threw down sheets of rain...





...then the skies cleared and we ate a Sunday dinner without a trace of wetness outside.

I’m glad, too, that I have the last of the apple blossoms to admire...





...that a trip to town today is delightfully cool and balmy so that our Madison skyline looks luminous and honorable.





There had been some gunfire in the neighborhood we traveled through and police redirected us to back streets to avoid any danger. But we never knew what the danger was and indeed, like the storms, the danger seems to have traveled elsewhere.


Tragic poems are born of tragic circumstances. I’m so glad that today I get to report that Ed finished replacing rotten boards outside, I continued to experiment with ant discouragement (the latest: coffee grounds from the café up the road), and the sun shown on my tulips inside. Nothing more.