30.

First, the picture is of my father's maternal grandfather, a tenant farmer of Pownal, Vermont, and father of nine. He was a big fellow, but he was crushed to death by a bull he let out of the pen so it could get a little air.

Second, this has been harder and more fun than ever. I am glad it's over.

Third, what came today:

What Came Today

It's hard to think in this green and black
breeze, though thinking never helped. How
it's always you and me and that which cannot
be got round. If yesterday was exciting, why.
Sitting at the edge of the bath, bathing at the edge,
sins washed clean, secret sins amassing like dust
in the far corners of the closets, all these sins
of the puppy. This is high church, puppy church,
the climbing, the pawing, the gnawing,
when all you longed for was interaction.
Or the main thing. (Even puppies refuse absolutes.)
As the Greeks said, or the Chinese, or maybe Will,
Conscience can make slaves of nobles of long lineage.
What I mean is Look up now. Come.

29.

Greetings from the Girl-King of Crazy

Consider St. Monica, the nag who did not cause
the conversion of Augustine but bickered
for it, lowing always, leaving post-its.

Keep your shirt on! I was a victim
of my unconscious, a lithe boomerang
with a hell of a sharp edge. I couldn't
know what I was grumbling for, rumbling,
purple waiting (misunderstanding that, too)
for the strepitus to snap us all out of it.

And once in a while, you followed along.