more tea

This Friday started off slow--just a couple of advising meetings in the morning. But the afternoon was chairing the WGS section of MASAL, presenting a paper, showing up to a mentoring pod (somehow, I'm the senior-most and the most mentor-y), and then the faculty meeting. The final part of the workday was the annual International Women's Day Tea at MacCurdy House. 

The last part was my favorite, but I was tired when I got home. Thus endeth (I think!) my spate of late evenings at work this semester. 

Pic: Tea at MacCurdy. The Eleanor Roosevelt quote framed on the wall makes it perfect: “A woman is like a tea bag. You never know how strong it is until it's in hot water.”  Memories of other years: Pre-pandemic and Post-pandemic

"to everything there is a season..."

I spend hours every week caring for my plants in our indoor tea garden. It's a narrow space, but since it runs the length of our great room, the greenery and light lift me up every time I pass through. 

But... when I decide to sit in there to actually drink a cup of tea, I find that instead of experiencing calm and enjoying the space as it is, my eyes are darting around to check for errant dirt or for yellowing and browning leaves to pull, and other things to fix or move.

This is silly. It's a garden, there'll always be dead leaves and dirt and things to do. My new exercise is to enjoy the space without worrying about perfecting things. I lit the candle L gave me (lavender and neroli), breathed in the scent of my hyacinths budding, and marveled at the begonias blooming for the sixth year in a row. 

There's gunk on the bird pedestal under the small cachepot... but I'll clean it in the time allotted to cleaning. This is not that time.   

Pic: Tablescape with plants, flowers, and candle.

upcoming

"A book must be an axe for the frozen sea inside us." 

Kafka in a letter to Oskar Pollak 

As it happens: 

I have some books

I have at least two axes

I have the frozen sea

so I have all 3/3

*

the day is cloud-colored

my hair is in my eyes

I travel inside the love 

I have built for you

where it is windy

*

but this time tomorrow

Spring will be closer

these shoots coming up

groping their way into 

the air, would agree 

________________
Pic: Tulips (I think) coming up... Not my garden (I wish). From a quick walk to MSU this morning.

a koan noting nothing

look, I said to the sky
my yearning is born 
in the wrong time

these hands that held

books and babies 

now hold air 

even falling like beauty 

this light is silent

oh, cold god  

___________________

Notes: I like knowing "nothing" was pronounced "noting" in Elizabethan English. The "nothing" itself didn't come from emptiness but from a very long 12-hour (14 with the commute) work day.

Pic: The REDress Project by Jaime Black-Morsette at MSU. From my walk yesterday.

I march forth

It's only my fourth year of knowing my birthday doubles as "March Forth Day," but I'm carpeing everything I can out of the diem. 

It's the Monday after break, so there was tons to do. Plus, I had to send an overdue change of schedule postponing everything to both the publisher and editor. But I owned up and did that like a grown-up. Then I found some time to take myself out for a long walk and a long soak and read for an hour amidst my plants. 

Evening was dinner with the fam at Ruckus Ramen, and then back home for presents and cakes (pistachio-raspberry-lemon + a Whole Foods Chantilly cream with fruit as At is allergic to pistachios.)

I am ever so grateful for every minute of this. 

Pic: At's friend H took this picture of us (Big A, Nu, me, At). H also drew me a "three-legged cat" for my birthday, which I know I will hang on to for a while because... memories. 

"take a hike," they said

Well, actually no one did. But it has become a tradition to go on a hike before my birthday. Last year we went to the Ledges on a very snowy day. This year I couldn't have asked for a better day for my pre-birthday hike! It was such a balmy 60+ degrees and sunshiny and at some point, I had to slip my arms out of my long-sleeved shirt and wore the sleeves dangling like an extra pair of arms. 

Burchfield Park--new to me--was an easy eight-mile loop and scenic all the way through.

Pic: Big A my navigator + water and snack carrier ahead of me. 

just killing time/filling the silence

mothers look away from me now
seconds abscond with sense 
in glissandos of angst

dreams pour out their sure poison 
I play it safe and then pretend 
--what? I don't understand

watching homes bloom in flame
and wart and scab into craters 

--I am an earnest surveyor

of everything left unsaid, noting
the news burns the day when 
it could be lit up with peace 

_____________________________

Note: Someday I will write a poem about Aaron Bushnell, but this is not it.

Pic: A mallard couple by themselves... they took to the water as we neared and I felt bad for disturbing their peace. Baker Woods Bog with L and T.