Poem for Friday, The Orville, Hillwood

To Know the Dark
By Wendell Berry

To go in the dark with a light is to know the light.
To know the dark, go dark. Go without sight,
and find that the dark, too, blooms and sings,
and is traveled by dark feet and dark wings.

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Thursday was cold -- not as cold as the parts of the country that are really suffering, but cold enough that my fingers hurt taking a walk outdoors, so instead I walked in the mall after having lunch with friends there. Other than looking at Valentine stuff, I didn't really shop, though if I had known Crabtree and Evelyn was closing, I would have!

We watched tonight's episode of The Orville, which I liked a lot until the very end when Claire decided it was fine to make it all about what Isaac needed instead of what they could be together -- come on, she's an adult with a child! From Hillwood in January, some holiday-decorated rooms and some of Dina Merrill's childhood and wedding clothes:

Poem for Thursday and Winter Deck Visitors

Birds At Winter Nightfall (Triolet)
By Thomas Hardy

Around the house the flakes fly faster,
And all the berries now are gone
From holly and cotoneaster
Around the house. The flakes fly!--faster
Shutting indoors that crumb-outcaster
We used to see upon the lawn
Around the house. The flakes fly faster,
And all the berries now are gone!

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Wednesday started chilly, then we had an afternoon snow squall and now it's very cold, though not by current standards in Chicago and Milwaukee, nor even as cold as it was in New York when we were there a couple of weekends ago. So I really was not in the mood for being outdoors much, though I did walk in the park for a few minutes to get to a Palkia raid. Mostly I worked at home around cats who wanted to be in my lap and on my table to keep warm.

In the evening we watched The Masked Singer, which I've read has been picked up for another season -- I'm really not a talent show fan but this show is compulsively watchable and I'm sure they ordered the judges to sound like complete idiots just to get people mocking them on Twitter. I'm having trouble watching late night comedians this week because Chris Christie is everywhere, ugh! Some photos of the birds in the snow these past several days:

Poem for Wednesday, First Man, Snowstorm

The Bear, The Fire, And The Snow
By Shel Silverstein

'I live in fear of the snow,' said the bear.
'Whenever it's here, be sure I'll be there.
Oh, the pain and the cold,
when one's bearish and old.
I live in fear of the snow.'

'I live in fear of the fire,' said the snow.
'Whenever it comes then it's time I must go.
with its yellow lick flames
leaping higher and higher,
I live in fear of the fire.'

'I live in fear of the river,' said the fire.
'It can drown all my flames anytime it desires,
and the thought of the wet
makes me sputter and shiver.
I live in fear of the river.'

'I live in fear of the bear,' said the river.
'It can lap me right up, don't you know?'
While a mile away
you can hear the bear say,
'I live in fear of the snow.'

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Paul worked from home because we had a plumber coming to look at the upstairs bathroom (verdict: sink fixture needs to be replaced, so we need to go pick one out). Since the schools were closing early and most of the county recreation facilities were shut for impending snow, this was just as well. Since First Man is now streaming, we watched that while working (verdict: very well acted, stunningly filmed, fantastic score, some weird, depressing script choices). And I got the laundry folded.

It was snowing quite hard by 5 p.m., but a friend who was in the neighborhood for a Kyogre raid offered to give me a ride to the first local Palkia raid at a nearby church, so I gratefully accepted since I did not want to drive with it coming down so hard. We watched The Flash, in which Nora still does not make any sense, then caught up on the Supergirl we missed, in which Nia and Kara are awesome and the show finally replicates Smallville's growing-up-super is like growing-up-gay parallel. Snow pics:

Poem for Tuesday and Tip of Manhattan

Song of the Sea
By Rainer Maria Rilke
Translated by Albert Ernest Flemming

Timeless sea breezes,
sea-wind of the night:
you come for no one;
if someone should wake,
he must be prepared
how to survive you.

Timeless sea breezes,
that for aeons have
blown ancient rocks,
you are purest space
coming from afar...

Oh, how a fruit-bearing
fig tree feels your coming
high up in the moonlight.

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I had a nice, busy Monday because I had a bunch of things I wanted to get done before being trapped in the house by a snowstorm on Tuesday. I met Karen and Jim for lunch at the Big Greek Cafe, which was lovely because I have not seen them since before the winter holidays -- it's been a crazy month -- then I did a bunch of shopping on Rockville Pike, including stops at both A.C. Moore and Michaels which were both unsuccessful since they've both removed their holiday sale sections in favor of Easter merchandise! Pier 1 still has some winter things but World Market, not much.

In the late afternoon I took down a bunch of Star Trek collectible plates that have been hanging precariously in our bedroom (one nearly fell during the roof repairs) and put up some more nautical decor that's much more my style of the past decade. I love the advent of turtle and starfish-shaped sparkly string lights. We had veggie gyros for dinner, since I brought Paul some of the spicy feta from lunch. Now we're caught up on Black Lightning, which was very sad tonight, and Madam Secretary, which was frustrating. Here are some photos from Battery Park last week:

Poem for Monday, Rent, Cabin John Park

D.O.A.
By Tim Dlugos

"You knew who I was
when I walked in the door.
You thought that I was dead.
Well, I am dead. A man
can walk and talk and even
breathe and still be dead."
Edmond O'Brien is perspiring
and chewing up the scenery
in my favorite film noir,
D.O.A. I can't stop watching,
can't stop relating. When I walked down
Columbus to Endicott last night
to pick up Tor's new novel,
I felt the eyes of every
Puerto Rican teen, crackhead,
yuppie couple focus on my cane
and makeup. "You're dead,"
they seemed to say in chorus.
Somewhere in a dark bar
years ago, I picked up "luminous
poisoning." My eyes glowed
as I sipped my drink. After that,
there was no cure, no turning back.
I had to find out what was gnawing
at my gut. The hardest part's
not even the physical effects:
stumbling like a drunk (Edmond
O'Brien was one of Hollywood's
most active lushes) through
Forties sets, alternating sweats
and fevers, reptilian spots
on face and scalp. It's having
to say goodbye like the scene
where soundtrack violins go crazy
as O'Brien gives his last embrace
to his girlfriend-cum-Girl
Friday, Paula, played by Pamela
Britton. They're filmdom's least
likely lovers—the squat and jowly
alkie and the homely fundamentally
talentless actress who would hit
the height of her fame as the pillhead-
acting landlady on My Favorite Martian
fifteen years in the future. I don't have
fifteen years, and neither does Edmond
O'Brien. He has just enough time to tell
Paula how much he loves her, then
to drive off in a convertible
for the showdown with his killer.
I'd like to have a showdown too, if I
could figure out which pistol-packing
brilliantined and ruthless villain
in a hound's-tooth overcoat took
my life. Lust, addiction, being
in the wrong place at the wrong
time? That's not the whole
story. Absolute fidelity
to the truth of what I felt, open
to the moment, and in every case
a kind of love: all of the above
brought me to this tottering
self-conscious state—pneumonia,
emaciation, grisly cancer,
no future, heart of gold,
passionate engagement with a great
B film, a glorious summer
afternoon in which to pick up
the ripest plum tomatoes of the year
and prosciutto for the feast I'll cook
tonight for the man I love,
phone calls from my friends
and a walk to the park, ignoring
stares, to clear my head. A day
like any, like no other. Not so bad
for the dead.

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We had a quiet Sunday morning with various projects we put off while our kids were home, then we had soup and crackers for lunch and went to take a walk at Locust Grove in Cabin John Park. The snow is gone and the trails are pretty muddy, but there's some ice on the creek and in puddles on the ground, and there are cardinals and eastern bluebirds in the trees, so it's quite pretty. We stopped at Giant and CVS on the way home.

In the late afternoon, we picked up Maddy, who is moving back to California very early on Monday -- she has better job prospects out there -- and went to meet Alice, Jeremy, and Avery at the Metro 29 Diner. We haven't all had dinner together since not long after Maddy moved out here, so that was lovely! Then we came home for Rent on Fox, also lovely and nostalgic and powerful. We'll have lots of regular Sunday TV to catch up on.

Poem for Sunday, Breathe, Washingtonian Lake

I Could Not Tell
By Sharon Olds

I could not tell I had jumped off that bus,
that bus in motion, with my child in my arms,
because I did not know it. I believed my own story:  
I had fallen, or the bus had started up
when I had one foot in the air.

I would not remember the tightening of my jaw,  
the irk that I’d missed my stop, the step out  
into the air, the clear child
gazing about her in the air as I plunged
to one knee on the street, scraped it, twisted it,  
the bus skidding to a stop, the driver
jumping out, my daughter laughing
Do it again.

I have never done it  
again, I have been very careful.
I have kept an eye on that nice young mother
who lightly leapt
off the moving vehicle
onto the stopped street, her life
in her hands, her life’s life in her hands.

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Adam spent Saturday morning packing and reading about his upcoming classes while I tried to get the house in some semblance of order. At lunchtime, we went to Minerva for the Indian buffet, and since we were nearby, we also stopped at Kohl's to get Adam a new belt, though since most of the winter clothes are on a big sale, Paul and I also grabbed some bargains. Then we walked around Washingtonian Lake to see the geese and gulls standing on the ice.















When we got back to the house, Adam packed up his car and headed to College Park. Paul and I watched the free dance at the US figure skating championships, followed by Breathe, the Andrew Garfield film about the polio victim turned activist for the disabled, which is fairly formulaic as such biopics go (loyal wife, quirky humor, privilege that makes progress possible) but well acted and nicely filmed. We're still full from lunch so we just nibbled for dinner!

Poem for Saturday and Seaglass Carousel

Carousel
By Jaya Savige

Dense night is a needs thing.

You were lured
     in a luminous canoe
said to have once ruled
     a lunar ocean.

     The 2 am soda pour
of stars is all but silent;
only listen — 

   sedater than a sauropod
     in the bone epics
it spills all the moon spice,

     releasing a sap odour
          that laces
     us to a vaster scale
          of road opus.

A carousel of oral cues,
these spinning sonic coins.

A slide show of old wishes.

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Since it was Adam's last full day at home before his winter break ends, he decided to start cleaning his room for the big move in the spring. He is much better at decluttering than I am -- I can tell you where I got pretty much everything I own, I get attached to inanimate objects very easily -- so now I have a few extra penguin figurines and he has far fewer McDonalds toys. We both got rid of some clothes, at least.

We had dinner with my parents after I went to a big Groudon raid where we're hoping to trigger an EX raid next week. Then we came home and watched the women's long program at the U.S. figure skating championships while Adam tested our guitars since he's taking a guitar class with Katherine next semester. Here's the Seaglass Carousel in Battery Park, but photos don't do it justice, so here is a video clip as well!