Saturday, May 01, 2010

Poem for Saturday and Irresistible Goslings

A Crosstown Breeze
By Henry Taylor


A drift of wind
when August wheeled
brought back to mind
an alfalfa field

where green windrows
bleached down to hay
while storm clouds rose
and rolled our way.

With lighthearted strain
in our pastoral agon
we raced the rain
with baler and wagon,

driving each other
to hold the turn
out of the weather
and into the barn.

A nostalgic pause
claims we saved it all,
but I've known the loss
of the lifelong haul;

now gray concrete
and electric light
wear on my feet
and dull my sight.

So I keep asking,
as I stand here,
my cheek still basking
in that trick of air,

would I live that life
if I had the chance,
or is it enough
to have been there once?

--------

It was a pretty quiet Friday -- I slept much later than I intended because I had cats on top of me, and ran behind the rest of the day doing just about everything else, though Google was not helpful -- I had minor Gmail issues and HUGE Google Docs issues, particularly since it refused to load any version of a document I'd written after 2 p.m. and I thought I'd lost my entire review of Star Trek: The Next Generation's "Birthright, Part One" -- fortunately it kept showing up in offline Google Docs on my desktop computer, though the laptop absolutely refused to synchronize and find any later versions.

Adam came home and made this epic caterpillar video with his camera and some kind of sound editing program, while Daniel worked on things he needs to know for his statistics and calculus AP exams next week. We had dinner with my parents, I talked briefly to my college roommate whom I'm hoping to see next weekend when we're in New York for my niece's Bat Mitzvah in the town next to hers, then we watched Smallville which I was delighted to see was co-written by Justin Hartley -- so good looking and he writes too, and such lovely moments as "The Kandorians aren't the only family you have, Clark." I didn't love the rest of the episode, too much violence particularly against women and no Lois, but I was fighting with my computer again so I might have been distracted.

The Friday Five: Teeth
1. How often do you brush your teeth?
Two or three times a day, sometimes more if I eat something heinous
2. What kind of toothpaste do you use? Colgate
3. How often do you floss? Not as often as I should according to my dentist
4. How many cavities have you had? No idea. Maybe three as an adult? Two on my rear molars which are slightly impacted with the molars beside them.
5. Do you/did you have braces? A retainer? Headgear? Rubber bands? An expander? None of the above.

Fannish 5: Name five songs that remind you of any five characters from fandom.
1. "Always a Place" by Marina Belica
(Severus Snape from Harry Potter)
2. "Southern Cross" by Crosby, Stills & Nash (Jack Aubrey from Master & Commander)
3. "Exile" by Lisa Moscatiello (The Doctor from Doctor Who)
4. "It Is Time" by November Project (Aragorn from The Lord of the Rings)
5. "Jubilee" by Mary Chapin Carpenter (Kathryn Janeway from Star Trek: Voyager)

And some more goslings from Lake Whetstone, because there's really only one week a year when there are goslings around to be enjoyed and this is that week (I forgot LiveJournal would be down tonight, so these photos may not show up until tomorrow):















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