Catching up

It's been many months since I added anything here. Summer and fall flew by, and now, in December, I can hardly believe I haven't added anything since May. I intended to do better.

The photos are of a tree at the river. I am sure it is home to the spirit of a deer, reincarnate. How else to explain? My friend Vicki says that 8 & 10 pt. deer wanderup to nibble bushes under her windows at night and she watches them, only inches away.

Our experiences this summer related to wildlife (at the river)included a bear, some snakes and frogs, and a skunk who liked our shed. For some reason, no deer. I have a theory about that I will share another day.

Astromaniacal

there are some who say that there is a right
and a left in (the) heaven... – Aristotle

Times when the world
is most spherical, casting
its curved shadow

on the moon, water
and light follow
rules, there's a grid

you can count on, but
now, in this alley of slant-
time when an iron hand

draws a latitude/longitude
of shattered glass, a chaos
geography turning,

in the heat, to dogma,
we're caught in an old vise,
pressed narrow, almost flat.

New neighbors

The eagles are back, and we are able to get a clear view---till the surrounding trees leaf out...we love watching from a distance. Shot these about an hour before sundown. Momma and Poppa were switching places on the nest.

Cherry Pie

For Bonnie Jo, and anyone else who hasn't read "Cherry Pie", From Con Hilberry's chapbook, The Fingernail of Luck:

...between/ two buttered crusts.../flesh so deeply sugared it/ astounds the mouth./ To coax it all to bed, a downy// pillow of whipped cream./...

Salivate, salivate...

Quite the contrast in pics, eh? What a difference a day's flight can make:
sun, surf, fresh seafood, and angels loking out for us through the night...

new link

I'm adding a link to Tracy's blog. She spends many months in Thailand and its bordering countries, and Japan, and her accounts of people she knows/meets, her lovely photos, and the her accounts of cultural info. make for good reading. Tracy teaches language some of the time, and travels/sightsees. You may enjoy following her travels over the coming months (she has just arrived there from Kalamazoo) or, reading her accounts from last year. The photos alone are worth a visit. A nice taste of warmth in the middle of winter. I followed her link to a guest house where she stays. The unbelievably low rates for accomodations made me rethink our winter get-away plans.

ambiguity-resolving machine"

Researchers say our brains aren't like cameras, or siesmic recorders. They don't directly input raw data and and faithfully reproduce it. The brain "analyzes and deconstructs" input, then reorganizes it, constructing its own reality based on the weft & woof of our experience, the associations and parameters the brain has acquired/developed. One writer calls the brain the "hypothesis generator" and cautions, "Sensation is an abstraction not a replication of the real world." Which explains a lot. Why we can never entirely understand each others' experiences. Why it's so impossibly difficult to get our sense of something down on the page. It's why we hunt around for some way to show on another what's going on in our brains for even a few moments. If our every sensation is, in fact abstract, it's no wonder we tumble ideas and images around and around in our brains, hunting for the combination, the order, the rhythms, that can paint that sensation in a way that is justours. A way that represents our hypothesis---our resolution or lack of it.
Here I am full circle, trying to wrap my brain around what I've read, trying to tell you how the information weaves itself into what I already think I know. And prose isn't doing it. I need a poem, for lack of anything better...