. . . Because the earth knows

The scent of history,

It gave the people sage.

 

I like my tea with sage

From my mother’s garden,

Next to the snapdragons

 

She calls fishmouths

Coming out for air. A remedy

For stomach pains she keeps

 

In the kitchen where

She always sings. . .

~ Excerpt from “Tea and Sage,” by Fady Joudah

Oh, that moon tonight. It rose in the dark sky and caught my eye, after dinner, as I sat at my computer, on Zoom. I was live-streaming a poetry reading with Fady Joudah, the 2024 JACKSON POETRY PRIZE READING, Fady Joudah in Conversation With Pádraig Ó Tuama. And then I met with two of my poetry pals I’ve been meeting with once a month for years after we met at a Tupelo Poetry Intensive in Taos. Marlon was working on a song, Randy read a short story in progress, and I read a new poem I’ve been working on for awhile. Today I found, on my walk with Charlie before my swim, a wooly caterpillar. Which, apparently, is not really a caterpillar at all, and is, according to the Farmer’s Almanac, a fabled predictor of weather. And, oh! I was happy to see the turtlehead flowers in bloom, wild blossoms, on the trail in Rocky Narrows. Especially because the plant I planted in my garden this summer was accidentally wrecked when I had to move the garden by the outdoor shower and so I will never see it in bloom and will have to replace it next year. I just love this August/September wildflower. The hot summer, extra summer weather continues and the crickets are noisy through all my open windows and I am very very ready for a good night’s sleep, and grateful for their song and the air from the woods and the yard wafting into my lungs.