Poem for Friday and Repaired Locks

Vows
By E.C. Belli

I’ve been cradling the heavy cat in the half-dark
For an hour
She likes how I make her feel
And I like her—
I was mean to the dog
And now he’s dead
Well, not mean
Cold in moments
He could have used the warmth
I could tell and still did nothing about it
And so here I am
Paying—
Which I am accustomed to
And anyhow I am happy
To pay for such horrors, such ill manners
Of my character
Even if I do blame you for it—
How can I empathize with anything
When I can’t remember empathy
And you are the only mountain
For miles all around
I’ve had to learn to be kind again
To uncoil my tendrils into the light
Sometimes I pretend you are not a person
But a stone (how could I love
people again, if I didn’t?)
And I warn them: Little Ones,
Don’t learn from stones
They are too still
They are too sharp
Sometimes in the moonlight
They whisper terrible things

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 I didn't get a lot done Thursday but that was fine -- I moved my usual Wednesday lunchtime chat to Thursday since I was seeing relatives yesterday, so I spent a couple of hours talking to my high school friends about kids, work, the Delta variant, gardening, and what we're watching on TV these days. Paul and I fit in a walk (under threat of a thunderstorm) between a Pokemon raid and dinner (vegetarian souvlaki and Greek potatoes). 

Then we watched this week's episode of Fantasy Island from Tuesday before my usual Thursday night chat group, only four of us this week and most of us own Nirvana's Nevermind so I guess we're perverts? Then we watched some baseball, which for a change went well for the Orioles though not so much for the Nationals. Here are some photos of the new lock fittings in the C&O Canal at Great Falls, plus one of the old ones for comparison: