“If I have done anything, even a little, to help small children enjoy honest, simple pleasures, I have done a bit of good.”

― Beatrix Potter

I watered all the gardens of flowers and weeds before I walked and I found a very happy surprise: the milkweed transplants are not, in fact, dead! They aren’t thriving, exactly, but they are surviving––I found new shoots on the spindly plants whose leaves are yellowing. I was so happy to find that they will survive this year and put down their roots. Then, I went to the morning river, the sky was summery blue and cheerful and it was just growing warm and I stopped at the brook after passing the Jill in the pulpits, still glorious on the side of the trail. I had to go in earlier than usual for the poetry workshop I attend on Thursday morning. Last night I managed a quick revision on a poem I started over a year ago, I guess. Haven’t looked at it in many months. I wasn’t feeling very hopeful about accomplishing much. Then, in the workshop, like the milkweed, it surprised me with the positive response I received. Minor suggestions I agree with. My youngest sends me a video. I am not a fan of groundhogs. We’ve had many on this property over the years. She has been telling me about the one that lives in the front yard; she and her boyfriend watch it out the office window where they work. Somebody, I thought it was one of the rabbits, is eating the tops of my new perennials planted there. Well, now I see the whole story, as my daughter’s quick video today reveals it. I hope you enjoy it too. No, I’m not a fan of groundhogs, in general. But how can resist being a fan of this?

Pam Sneed, who also teaches on the faculty of our IWWG Summer conference, had a Poem of the Day published on Poets.org today. They published both a written and audio version of her reading it. It’s particularly moving in her voice.