Field Notes

Now

Stray whiskers

A bowl of stray whiskers, feline. I can’t decide if they are a collection or an offering. Some are

01 Apr

Now

Light-eater

"We eat light, drink it in through our skins." — James Turrell, artist & MacArthur Fellow, known for his

29 Mar

Now

Starfish

All night my mind full of starfish, their bodies a shock of salmon-y red, their bodies succulent hands and splayed

28 Mar

Now

Banana slug

Sometimes, kneeling before the yellow writhing of a banana slug sliming a window pane, I pray, hands pressing glass, watching

16 Mar

Now

Combs

Why give the comb teeth, that label, as if it’s a small fearful animal flashing it’s snarl and

12 Mar

Now

Heron

Take your glassy eyes away from whatever screen pierces them. Lift your weathered face out of whatever curiosity or burden

10 Mar

Now

Old conversation

So many years ago, a man we didn’t know well asked my husband, “Do you believe in God?” The

07 Mar

Now

Little salamander

"Hello, Little Salamander.” Heading out the garden room door, surprise, a dark-coppery sliver of movement, as my foot swings

04 Mar

Now

Agreements

What do we agreed to? Last night a 2-year-old video clip in the news feed: a baby pulled crying from

27 Feb

Now

Secret lily

Beneath the arms of a redwood, within it’s limbs hanging down, it is not the rain that finds me,

24 Feb

Now

Ruth Stone

Scanning a list of women poets this morning, I pause at Ruth Stone. I heard her read her work decades

11 Feb

Now

Birdy moment

In this house of wonderful tall windows, it can feel like living inside a snowglobe, only with cats and dust

11 Feb

Now

Invisible

Sometimes it seems I could be the only person on the planet. Stepping out on the deck past dusk, in

09 Feb

Now

Orb weavers

A week ago, a young man speaking of orb weavers in a deep ditch, hundreds of them, golden-yellow, their webs

07 Feb

Now

All the bears

Early morning, my husband half-waking out of sleep to tell me, “All the bears are dead.” I’m a bear-lover,

05 Feb

Now

Birthday

Today I become the age that my mother was when she died. Logically, I know it means nothing. We two,

02 Feb

Now

Despair

Despair is a kind of fire in the skin, that pink sheath stretched over the cheekbones, the red-rim at eye’

01 Feb

Now

Invisible trail

Who are we when we write? I’m in the last session of a brief writer’s workshop, a handful

31 Jan