I’m appalled to find I have a book-length ms of work written in 2020. How is this possible? I swear I spent the year hiding in bed or crushed in a chair staring blankly at an unread book. Frankly, I feel a little queasy that this shitshow year has been so productive for me.
Every morning, I stand in the darkness of my kitchen and think — maybe there was something I could have done in 1994 that would averted all of this.
My triple-booked evening: I’m listening to two poets having a conversation on composition, process, motherhood; a concert of musicians taking turns playing songs; and a group of poets reading their favorite poems by other poets. My cup — and attention span — overfloweth…
A late entry to the Bookmark project!
I pulled a book off the shelf just now and stumbled on this:
PSA: An Unearthly Child debuted 57 years ago today. Both Aldous Huxley and CS Lewis had died the previous day and there was so much coverage on the Beeb that the broadcast started 15 minutes late.
Well, it’s 8:30 on a Sunday night. Time to drink too much wine, revise old poems until they’re indecipherable, and listen to this on repeat.
After nearly a year, I think I’m finally ready to finish my rewatch of Until the End of the World. I savored the first disc late last December. After some distractions, I meant to pick it up again — but by February I knew I couldn’t handle that final sequence in the outback.
You come at science, you best not miss.
🔗 Two Rural States With GOP Governors And Very Different COVID-19 Results
What a brutal week. No, not brutal. What a week of extremes. Good, bad. Ugly, beautiful. Devastating and, at last, joyous. My heart has been broken for all of my fifty years. I inherited sorrow. I think: this is what makes things real. Without it, can you care, can you witness?
Before, there were literary events that I couldn’t attend because they were in distant cities or faraway countries. Now it’s because they’re all scheduled at the same time.
🔗 Payback’s a bitch: Merrick Garland Among Biden Candidates for Attorney General
🔗 Perfect headline at Mississippi Free Press: After Big Thanksgiving Dinners, Plan Small Christmas Funerals, Health Experts Warn. (via Minnpost)
Countdown
Sixty-three days left.
11/7: The race is declared for Kamala and her perfectly capable running mate.
12/14: State Electors cast their votes.
1/5: Georgia senate run-off election.
1/6: Joint session of Congress to ratify the results.
1/20: Inauguration Day.
Are you looking through the bent-back tulips to see how the other half lives? Well, now you can satisfy your literary voyeurism without all that skulking under windows or peering furtively through the hedge!
I am featured today at My (Small Press) Writing Day.
🔗 Excellent review of the brilliant new feminist translation of Beowulf
Kamala, in suffrage white. And her running mate gave a pretty good speech tonight, too. I guess he’ll do alright. Spread the faith.
I will be rereading the Scouring of the Shire. I want Frodo to be proud of our restraint and mercy, and Sam to be proud of our commitment to kindness and community.
The cheers and honking have been more or less constant here in south Minneapolis for the last two hours. A group of children and their parents just walked by with noisemakers, laughing. Cars have been driving by with American flags waving out the open windows.
List #19
Oh, I said I would be talking about pencils, didn’t I? Sorry, it’ll have to wait a little bit longer.
How I Build Things: the second of two posts regarding my process as a writer
How I Build Things: the first of two posts regarding my process as a writer
🔗 538: When To Expect Election Results In Every State and NYTimes: How Quickly Will Your Absentee Vote Be Counted? A State-by-State Timeline
A song was stuck in my head for days. Just an arc of melody and a phrase. Not enough to identify it. Over and over. So familiar.
Finally it hit me: I wrote it. Thirty-two years ago. The strangest feeling, like looking in a mirror and not realizing it’s a reflection.
🔗 The Star Tribune is shutting down City Pages