1.26.16

I hope everyone who lives on the East coast weathered the Snowzilla or Jonas or whatever they're calling the massive precipitation they received. I love snow and must admit to deep envy, although I've heard salting isn't all that great, and that cabin fever is a real problem.

I also must admit to some slacking on the creative front, I hope that will return to normalcy soon. Here are some offerings for you. Do you have any for me? I need some inspiration.




Mud Season


Tess Taylor

We unstave the winter’s tangle.
Sad tomatoes, sullen sky.

We unplay the summer’s blight.
Rotted on the vine, black fruit

swings free of strings that bound it.
In the compost, ghost melon; in the fields

grotesque extruded peppers.
We prod half-thawed mucky things. 

In the sky, starlings eddying.
Tomorrow, snow again, old silence.

Today, the creaking icy puller.
Last night I woke

to wild unfrozen prattle.
Rain on the roof—a foreign liquid tongue.

First Snow

Arthur Sze

A rabbit has stopped on the gravel driveway:

                            imbibing the silence,
                            you stare at spruce needles:

                                                        there’s no sound of a leaf blower,
                                                        no sign of a black bear;

                a few weeks ago, a buck scraped his rack
                            against an aspen trunk;
                            a carpenter scribed a plank along a curved stone wall.

                                         You only spot the rabbit’s ears and tail:

                when it moves, you locate it against speckled gravel,
                but when it stops, it blends in again;

                            the world of being is like this gravel:

                                         you think you own a car, a house,
                                         this blue-zigzagged shirt, but you just borrow      

                                               these things.

                Yesterday, you constructed an aqueduct of dreams
                                           and stood at Gibraltar,

                                                                      but you possess nothing.

                Snow melts into a pool of clear water;
                              and, in this stillness,

                                            starlight behind daylight wherever you gaze.

Do you have favorite pieces for this time of year? One of my favorite short stories is Winter Dreams by F Scott Fitzgerald, although it does treat other times of the year as well. Winter has always been a favorite (tied with fall), possibly biased because my birthday falls in winter. This season is a great time for reading, contemplation, creativity, and other things that come from staying inside more than normal. Enjoy!