Big Dog the Builder

One day, this will be a bicycle shed.

_

Meditation

the right breath for the right moment

the banal miracle of waking time

sun from woodpile

dew from the dark

kneading words from confusion

the shape of paint from bluster

flower from loam--

lighting life's candle

glances thickening like honey,

nearing the ledge of knowing

_

Song

My heroes are broken, broke
their shadows mix with mine.
Remember us as we first were--

at home before the shadows
the coincidence of accidents
--spread on wide wings of day

_

New Friend

In (book-) related news, this reminded us of Jeff VanderMeer/Alex Garland's Annihilation and led to me obsessively asking At where our copy of the Richard Powers book The Overstory went...

Where is it?
Did you find it yet?

_

Mantra

today goes
tomorrow grows

with night,
then light

the heart's rise
the sun's shine

it may not be
my business

it may be
my life

-

Life's Beach-y

It was so hot at the beach today...

Kirk Park Beach allows doggies off-leash,

but Scout Akshaya and Huck Amulya 

were a bit skittish and stayed close to mama.

One with all the kids--whenever their album comes out, 

this pic could go on the cover.

_

Independence Day/#SecondCivilWar

Dinner with neighbors and then off to Adado Park 

for the concert band and fireworks.

The enemy suffered a rout because of our optimism 

and the extraordinary American dream 

of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness for all.

(Clearly, I spent a chunk of the day chuckling over #SecondCivilWar )

_

Hikes with L

I've been waking up earlier to go on hikes with neighbor L who has lived here for a long time and seems to know the most fun trails all around. A moment where the weather, time away from teaching, and my life crush (L is totally life goals for me) come together.

Over the past week, we've seen everything.

From tucked-away horticultural gardens,

to forest paths,

to graffiti wonderlands

(this one under a Red Cedar River bridge).

_

Lazy-day craft

A pom-pom garland from Target, an old pillow...

and ta-da, I have the perfect pillow accent...

I'll have to tether the strings, but otherwise...

we're all done. It took < 10 mins.
(And most of that was trying to open the package without scissors.)

_

New Calendar

Half the year is done, and I almost bought a new 2018-19 calendar when Amma and I were out shopping today. I've been terrible about putting things in my 2018 calendar, and I've been terrible about making posts here. It's a decades-long pattern of letting summer disappear into heat-induced happiness. But of course I thought buying a new calendar would magically fix that.

I'm aiming for more accountability this summer while I make memories with my mama and bebés, get all the writing done, tackle some overdue decor projects; get pool time and yoga time and book time.

Let's see.

_

Families Belong Together

Never Forget

Both grandmothers

Three generations at Ocean's 8

NuNu begged for and got 

the fancy-schmancy seats

at Studio C.

 I'll admit it was nice
to have the food
delivered to our seats.

_

"Temple Monkeys"

Everyone had gone to bed by the time I lit the Friday lamps, 

so the puppies were the only ones who got bottus.

_

Errands

Nu and I dropped off a bunch of stuff at Goodwill, the consignment store, and the bookstore 

I don't know what we were expecting, but it wasn't 31 bucks to spend at will at Schuler's.

_

"I have all these friends mama"

Last day of school; no yearbook.

In which I embarrass my family on Facebook

"Tony died."

At came down to breakfast. breaking the news about Anthony Bourdain--apologetically. And now, at the end of the day, I am just grateful that everyone I know online seems to recognize the curiosity, empathy, and generosity that made him so extraordinary. Big A had worked overnight, but I knew that this would be the one celeb whose passing would affect him. And sure enough, as soon as he got off his shift, he texted: "Tony died." We have all his books, watched some of his shows back when we had time, and knew enough to love him. And all my media and/or NYC people had stories about meeting him, of him being an ally without making it all about himself.

On the way home from getting Nu from school, while we were waiting for the train to clear the tracks, we were rear-ended. I had taken the puppies for a little car ride, and Huck is so tiny that she flew into Nu's lap from the backseat. I went to talk to the driver of the other car, and it was a young woman who immediately began apologizing so profusely, all my criticisms were silenced. It looked like both cars were fine, and she swore that she wasn't texting, so I told her to be safe, and brought the kids home. Big A was rather loud and adamant that I should have taken her insurance information anyway.

Of course, I've been crying--somewhat disproportionately--since then.
_

Field Trip All Day

Greenfield Village: Nu's backpack holds 

bug spray, sunscreen, lunch, a water bottle, 

phone, headphones, assorted purchases 

and THREE books she brought from home.

When Nu went to pretend suffragette jail. 

We'd just watched excerpts from Iron Jawed Angels* in there 

and her expression while appropriate, nevertheless cracks me up. 

Both girls were horrified that women were not allowed to attend college.

The real, actual, Rosa Parks Bus. 

I loved that  Nu remembered 

the statue of Rosa Parks sitting in the Capitol 

from our D.C. visit two years ago.

"Everyone else is standing, but she gets to sit."

* And as I linked to the film's Wikipedia link, I was mildly horrified both by the lack of a hyphen in the title and the gratuitous seminudity on the poster. Really?!?

Summer 'Hang'

I'm trying to transcend gravity 

on Nu's webby swing while she's at school.

 My companion is the other little girl 

who--just like her mama--loves the sun.

_

Yet another 'piece'

Up the road from Nu's school.
This culture gets more terrifying every day.

_

Journeys

End-of-term Academic Standards Committee meetings where students are dismissed, put on probation, etc. are difficult. When I recognize students' names, it's difficult not to mourn the lost opportunities for learning, success, accomplishment... Today I recognized two students from my FYS who had been best friends all through grade school and then roomed together at college. Fun, likable kids who showed up increasingly sleep-deprived in class and then frequently not at all. It was difficult not to take it personally--I thought you liked my class! It's little consolation that their transcripts appear to show that they did even less in other classes. I wish we'd been able to reach them in time. Perhaps they will be back someday or find another path through college.

At least I had some good company on the way there and back. I'd originally taken this pic because my sister had demanded a picture of me smiling, but this picture is here for a completely unrelated reason. We were listening to Kendrick Lamar when I took this pic, and I feel like At LOOKS LIKE HIM in that moment through some weird aural alchemy.

_

Extra AF

Peonies and roses are always already a bit showoff-y

(I love summer)

_

So-Low

At's Boss Day: we went to see Solo at Studio C. At and Nu want to talk about how it was super dark that Chewie was eating prisoners. Ugh. I don't want to think about it.

Me: Wookie's are vegetarian, Chewie doesn't eat people.
Kids: He was eating Porgs in the last one; he's not vegetarian.
Me: They just made up that bit--it's not true.
Kids: [Giggling]
At: Depends on what you mean by "made up"--technically, he's a fictional character.

Guess they got me there.
--

Doctrine

translating clouds
into panting,
thirst-throated air

arguing until
finally linear
in clemency

until I spider
empty, blank
to the-end-ing

descending, and
taking little boats
to the i-land

making pronouns
for the future,
which is now.

_

Deeply Beloved

And extremely effective
 Abdul El-Sayed campaign worker!

_

Princely

the sentimental sediment--
rainbows in rain puddles,

your breast darkening--
cold lake, bright day

hoarding every murmur
as an insect's confession

I look for you in the desert
when heat dies deeply purple

_

A Day

the smells of summer
the patterns of rain
the limits of day

under satisfaction
the shadowy dirt
of an open road

--

Also, what Nu got in her summer basket:

(At got something similar)

(Water bottle, headband, hat, notebook (all items $1); tanks, 

Black Panther, Aru Shah, sunscreen for school, a Lansing city passport.)

--

Summer

love
like a holiday
(the British holiday)
(ok, although perhaps
holy as the American too)
seeing it unfurl in your face
feeling it come to fire in your touch
hearing it in your safe, sea-like sibilance

_

I Miss the Children

The shadow of a smile
the shadow of a shadow

of a shadow
of a smile

keeps showing up
restless

in changing light
in change

teeth, no teeth,
tight thin

lipless, this
shadow

the lost children
their lost parents

the circus of grief
the grimy

half-eaten repetitions
nothing will ever

be safe
be sane
be saved
in shadows




   An ICE prison bus full of baby seats.


_

"An Evening in India"

I've always wanted to run a restaurant, so I was so thrilled when people bid on my offering, "An Evening in India" at the UU silent auction. It was BUSY, so I don't have a single picture, but I'm going to leave the menu here.

I'll also leave it here that the kids chafed a bit at the relentless exotification and snarked: Do we have to dress up in Indian clothes too? Rascals.

An Evening in India Menu

Course 1:     A Warm Welcome

v Chiwda (fried lentil and dried fruit mix)

v Samosas (savory pastries)

v Aloo Tikki (spicy potato bites)

v Nimbu Pani (Lemon Water)

Course 2:     Fresh Beginnings

v Shorba: Carrot-ginger coconut-milk soup with roasted cauliflower

Course 3:     The Heart of it All

v Indian Flag Pulao (Basmati Rice with green peas and carrots)

v Mughalai Chicken with sultanas and apricots

v A very, very, very veggie curry with panneer (cottage cheese)

v Mango Dhal (Lentils with unripe mango, toasted coconut, coriander, and tomatoes)

v Cucumber and celery Raita (yogurt-cumin sauce) w/ mint

Course 4:     Sweet Endings

v Mango kulfi ice cream with cardamom and almond sprinkles

v Mava (milk and caramel cake)

v Mukhwas (mouth-freshening fennel candy)

v Mint Tea

Natural

The city grows only strangers,
grows even stranger

I have spread myself
out and I am eaten

I try to find myself
have found myself

then another self
and another
and another
and another

_

Summer Insomnia

the calendar builds
to a crescendo till
the creatures arrive--
airy resurrections in
their bony hearts, eyes
scary, still screeching.

Small, accruing doubt,
all the signals are
yelling the death knell
of cellphone carillons
stones, petals, shells--
night falls, folds over

_____________
Big A and I took a nap right around the time Nu gathered the puppies and headed off to bed, but we both woke up to the most godawful wildlife brawl at midnight. Then we stayed up until about 3 am 'chit-chatting' as kindergartner Nu used to call it.
_

Love and Flowers

Late last night at Meijer... I was beaming by the time I got to the end of the grocery shopping list, because as an addendum to her snack requests, Nu had penned a love note to me. Discussing that at breakfast gave me something else to smile at all day. I had missed bedtime since I had gone grocery shopping right after my book club meeting last night, so I asked Nu if she knew that I had come in to kiss her goodnight after she'd fallen asleep. "Yes," she said, "I know." And then: "I don't remember, because I was asleep, but I know you kissed me goodnight, because you always do that."

The kids are keeping me sane post Santa Fe, post Asifa, post Parkland, post, post, post... Kinda like how although it's wet and cold outside... but at least there are flowers.

moss roses, lobelia, elysium 

_

Late

night after night, I
turn to the window,
my eyes trained
to the earth's curvature,
for one star, out there

sometimes I give in
and flicken the lamp
which in blinking,
sticky as starlight,
is trembling to on

_

Rolling with the Homies

Woke up to At's text telling me that he was going off Twitter as someone had doxxed him.  He sent me an eerie screenshot of an exchange where the guy mentions us all by name.

I think I win some kind of award for what I texted At back:





And you know what? All jokes aside, I AM really proud of this kid.

_

Haven't been writing as much as I should be...

But so much THIS.

_

We Love the 80s

At first the birthday party was all


Then this happened

 

I'm so glad Big A got back from a week-long conference in Indy
so I could show up to L's party on time.


_

Projections

Today: Big A comes home form a week of conferencing.

Next Week: At comes home from college for the summer

Next Month: My mom comes for the rest of the summer.

Basically, I love summer.

_

These Kids

Carrying on

I didn't know how I would begin to carry on. I was doing every thing I needed to at work: completing courses, attending a dozen end-of-the year award ceremonies and banquets, grading, supporting and loving my students, writing letters of recommendation... but I'd come home and collapse in the library, curling up on the chair and falling asleep until everyone had gone to bed and sitting in silence between 11 pm and 4 am sometimes doing work, sometimes just going down the rabbit hole of rape.

But graduation happened and At's 19th birthday happened and suddenly summer seems to have happened. And I'm going to try and retrospectively recreate some days from memory and photographs. And carry on by fighting in all the places, spaces, and conversations I can.

_

Happy 19th!

@The English Inn 

We're all smiles here, 

but afterwards 

we went to Infinity War 

and cried.

-

Didn't Win Any Awards...

But my regalia always makes it into so many official photographs ¯\_(ツ)_/¯



_
\

(Fashion) Rampage

We had the theater to ourselves

unashamedly talking nonsense

and admiring The Rock

Spot the Differences (MacCurdy House Graduation Party Edition)

These pictures make me smile

although I will miss these young people so much.

_

Love Wolf

My companion through it all.

_

Asifa 2

I could be asleep
but I keep hearing her
hollow with hunger
elegiac from pain

there is the smiling face
there is the stilled corpse
in the same (only?) dress
her silence is my voice

with all its broken bones
the secret, broken seams
dreaming of home, return-
ing to an unbroken body

She knows more than I do
and yet like any child asks
why why why why
why why why why

-

Asifa 1

Asifa died in January
it was April when I learned
it is always already too late

We walk alone to the river
to the horse, to our homes
our thoughts catching

on branches of doubt
of light, rupture our
cruel, fool-ish world

Justice for Asifa

I feel a murderous rage coming on. I can't get the story of this child's face out of my head.

My dad was fond of the radical Tamizh poet Bharathiyaar who claimed, “Thani oruvanukku unavillai enil jagathinai azhithiduvom” (If even just one person does not have sustenance, let's burn down the whole world). 

And that's how I'm feeling today. No one deserves to be happy, no one deserves to live. Let's just nuke the planet and be done with this. 

_

Bits and Bobs

Last class for this academic year, and our class went downtown to the new frozen custard place. I like joking that it's the closest thing we have to a Sri Lankan restaurant in Alma because its name is Serendipity.

On our way back we bumped into the sweetest, cutest, eight-week old puppy. His name is Yogi. LOOK AT THAT FACE! JUST LOOK! Yogi is a very good boy and trots along happily except when he's turning around to look for all the new friends who give him pets.

Full admission: I saw Yogi for the first time yesterday when I was turning into the parking lot at school, and I totally rolled down my window and screamed, "so cute, SO CUTE!!" I guess I'm practically a TLC song now.

_

Sweet Meets

'Someone' stopped by my office and claimed that they weren't at all homesick, but lingered for over an hour to just talk, requested a bunch of food from home, told me he missed us ("Not all the time, okay? Just when we're all texting on family chat and stuff"), and even let me take his picture. I'm glad he's not homesick, but am so happy from getting some time with him.

I may have once wished that he'd choose head hair or face hair, but this groomed beard and tiny bun look really nice on him... in a hipster Chewie kind of way.

As he was leaving the English bay, I bumped into Sophfronia Scott who'd come to read for us last term, and whom I'd kept in touch with (via FB mostly). Turns out that she was on her way to a lit festival in Grand Rapids, and stopped over to see us. In an odd way, it feels like we've shared thoughts for a long, long time--it was lovely to see her again, and hang out at the coffeeshop for a while.

_

What?!?

_

A Monday

This raw and heartbreaking article. I started reading it in the school pickup line--anxious and breathless after the first paragraph.

That poor child. His poor family. The poor women who were gaslighted. But mostly, and over and over... that poor, poor child. In a way, the skeleton of dysfunction was visible for so long--the delayed second book, the frenzied relationships--and yet, this is a necessary speaking up, a necessary fleshing out... even from three decades away.

I was nice to Nu. But Big A knew enough to leave me alone after I growled at him a couple of times. Not like it's his fault--and he's the one who introduced me to Drown all those years ago--but he's used to my anti-patriarchy rages. And I got hugs and talking later. But god, this article. Children deserve so much better.

_