Still no sun and the woods are wet and we go out looking for what will lift our spirits weary of clouds. This mushroom, gangly, tall, top like a low lit lamp over the pine cones. And the trees, still green, deep greenly leaved leaning over the Charles, and this bird feeder on the bank, lichen covered and blending into the lush landscape. All of this helps. But mostly, it’s the evening, the long drive into Cambridge to meet a friend to go to a poetry reading, this is, finally, what lifts my spirit out of irritability and longing for sun. The tiny room is packed and we add some chairs to fill the room and spill out of it too for Gloria Mindock, her book launch, and Anne Pluto, who also reads. This morning at 4:00 a.m. I was wide awake and I didn’t want to be. Finally, I got up, made coffee, tried to write. I am trying to put together a draft of a poem I started this summer in a workshop on narrative poetry. I sit with it for about an hour, trying some things. I don’t get very far and I’m a bit frustrated, but that’s mostly just being overtired. I manage to go back to sleep. Tonight, in the chair at the back of the room while the poets read I got a possible first line for the poem and jotted it down. Maybe. Maybe tomorrow it will begin to have some energy or clarity or excitement or direction. Now, sleep, after appreciating this poem by Anne, it’s the season that’s approaching; my husband ordered two cords of wood, dumped on the lawn outside my window this morning. We will have fires.

All photos and text ©Kelly DuMar 2018