Poem for Friday and Summer Sunset

Strawberry Moon 

By John A. Nieves 

Tonight is for hilling the maize and picking the fruit.

To tell if it is ripe, we will press it against our teeth.

The flesh, the pip, the meat. If it is soft and weak, we

will eat. If it holds firm, then the basket until it brims

and the crickets swarm and sing in the bushes. A new

sweetness. I taste it on your cheek on the gentle

dip in your collar bone. There is enough breeze

to need a blanket, but not enough to shiver. I rest

the berries before you. In the dim, I see you wanting

but can't tell if it is for them or me. In the wet

morning, we will hill the corn. In the wet, we are

soft and weak gazing into the shadows between us. 

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Quickie, we were out with our neighbors watching the Strawberry Moon rise. I had a quiet morning, but a very fun afternoon: I had won a Kickstarter perk for a Tarot reading by Kris Waldherr, creator of The Goddess Tarot, and though I have known her online for decades, I have never spoken to her before Zoom today, so that was a great experience! 

We saw a bit of the Mariners-Marlins game (2-3, sad) and nearly all of the Orioles-Astros game (11-14, insane) this evening around dinner, then we started watching The Bear before going out to see the moon rise. We then went back to our neighbors' apartment to look at their nautical art without remembering how late the sun sets at this time of year!

Poem for Thursday and First Day of Summer

To Summer 

By William Blake 

O thou who passest thro' our valleys in

Thy strength, curb thy fierce steeds, allay the heat

That flames from their large nostrils! thou, O Summer,

Oft pitched'st here thy goldent tent, and oft

Beneath our oaks hast slept, while we beheld

With joy thy ruddy limbs and flourishing hair.

Beneath our thickest shades we oft have heard

Thy voice, when noon upon his fervid car

Rode o'er the deep of heaven; beside our springs

Sit down, and in our mossy valleys, on

Some bank beside a river clear, throw thy

Silk draperies off, and rush into the stream:

Our valleys love the Summer in his pride.

Our bards are fam'd who strike the silver wire:

Our youth are bolder than the southern swains:

Our maidens fairer in the sprightly dance:

We lack not songs, nor instruments of joy,

Nor echoes sweet, nor waters clear as heaven,

Nor laurel wreaths against the sultry heat.

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The summer solstice took place on Thursday, which was also the first day we passed 80 degrees on the thermometer. I spent a lot of it watching baseball -- some of the Mariners game in the morning while doing chores, most of the Orioles game in the afternoon as they beat the Yankees and set a major league division streak record, and some of the Cardinals-Giants game at Rickwood Field in honor of the Negro Leagues and Willie Mays, along with all the tributes within and around the broadcast. 

Otherwise, I talked to my Thursday night chat group for a couple of hours, watched the new (and extremely bloody) episode of The Boys, and took two walks -- one in the evening on the dock, where we saw four families of wood and mallard ducklings ranging in age from a few days old to nearly adult, and one in the late afternoon to the beach at Idylwood Park, where the eagles were in the air, the geese were in the lake, and there were people from all over swimming, diving, floating, and boating:

Greetings from Bridle Trails

Quickie, have just had dinner with Adam and belated birthday cake for Haley -- they're going to Ohio this weekend to look for places to live near Oberlin in the fall, so we figured we'd barbecue with them first. Earlier in the day I talked to two of my high school friends (including Haley's mom Hildy), then, since Paul had the day off for Juneteenth, we ate lunch and went to Bridle Trails State Park, where it was lovely and cool walking in the woods along the horse trails among the trees. We saw lots of birds and ferns and even some slugs, though not banana slugs. 

We stopped at Safeway on the way home for dinner supplies, took a walk on the dock where we discovered a new family of baby mallard ducklings and watched a raccoon and a heron eating fish, and watched the Orioles play the Yankees while preparing for dinner. The Orioles were in extra innings when Adam arrived, but Baltimore had won before we finished eating. We took another walk on the dock so he and Haley could see the ducklings, then we came back for cake and down time with Pepper. When they headed home, we watched Mysteries of the Terracotta Warriors on Netflix.

Poem for Tuesday and Sammamish River Walk

won't you celebrate with me 

By Lucille Clifton 

won't you celebrate with me

what i have shaped into

a kind of life? i had no model.

born in babylon

both nonwhite and woman

what did i see to be except myself?

i made it up

here on this bridge between

starshine and clay,

my one hand holding tight

my other hand; come celebrate

with me that everyday

something has tried to kill me

and has failed.

-------- 

Happy Juneteenth! Paul had Tuesday afternoon off -- they always do before holidays. So after some work in the morning, we went to Kitanda for lunch, then went to the Sammamish River Trail to enjoy the gorgeous not-quite-70-degree weather and see if we could find bunnies. We did, two of them, plus a couple of herons, several sorts of ducks, some songbirds, and many mole hills. The blackberry bushes are in bloom though not producing berries yet, and the salmonberries are starting to turn red. 

My Voyager group watched Drive, unmemorable except the marriage. Then we ate dinner during the end of the Orioles-Yankees game, which ended sadly for Baltimore though we were sadder to hear that Willie Mays had died. We've spent the evening bingeing the rest of Grantchester season 9 on the PBS app -- Alphy is great and I like him with Geordie, though Cathy deserves better from the show -- with a break for the penultimate Dark Matter, which is superbly acted and gripping and entirely unpredictable.

Poem for Monday and Rialto Beach

Rialto Beach 

By Tim Cresswell 

first     the carnage

silverwhite trees     wave-toppled and gale-gusted

strewn along the beach    sun bleached dinosaur bones

next     the balancing acts of stonestacks      a lone conifer

clings to invisibly thin soil    knots of bull-kelp

like spilled leviathan seed   fetid and fly-ridden    anemones in rock pools     

beckon me to finger their sticky tongues

a bald eagle circles    hounded by ravens

we keep on holding on      hoping for the best

settling     for something like circumstance

in the black basaltic sand     mingled with milk white

and amber agates     smooth ground sea glass jewels

amongst the fallen trunks      clunking chunks of rusted ship-iron

scattered fishing floats    a black plastic buoy

a walker     tells me of the wreck

the Chilean ship     the marker round the headland for the drowned

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My Monday was not exciting. Paul had a morning dentist appointment, so I sorted clothes while he was out -- after a year here, I have a much better idea of what needs to go to Goodwill vs what I wear -- and reassured the cats that they had not been abandoned and could let me make the bed. Then I did a bunch of computer work, and after lunch, we walked in the mist to the beach. 

Cheryl and I watched last night's excellent Interview with the Vampire together -- we both missed it watching Daniel Radcliffe win his Tony Award -- then I started watching the new season of Grantchester, where I will miss Will, but I thought I'd never stop missing Sidney, then forgot all about him. Rialto Beach in the evening, including me posing as son with kelp from 2005:

Greetings from Edmonds

Quickie while watching the west coast rerun of the Tony Awards. I had a nice Father's Day, though of course it wasn't about me -- watched the beginning of the Orioles game, Skyped with my and Paul's parents and kids, grabbed bagels, then went to the Edmonds Arts Festival, where we met the kids in person, looked at lots of crafts, ate some snacks, and enjoyed the gorgeous weather, flowers, and breeze from Puget Sound. 

Around the time the festival ended, we all headed to the Old Spaghetti Factory in Lynnwood for dinner, where we ate various pastas, soups, ice cream, and most of us had cotton candy limeade. I have few strong opinions about the Tony Awards this year since I know so few of the shows, but I'm happy for Daniel Radcliffe, Kecia Lewis, Jonathan Groff, and Danya Taymor, and it was great seeing Ariana DeBose and Nicole Scherzinger.

Poem for Saturday and Juanita Bay

A Taste of Blue 

By Cynthia Manick 

I tell my father about the way

I collect small things

in the sacs of my heart—

thick juniper berries

apple cores that retain their shape

and the click of shells

that sound like an oven baking.

He presses the mole on my shoulder

that matches his shoulder,

proof that I was not found

at the bottom of the sea.

I also got his feet, far from

Cinderella’s dainty glass slippers—

and fingers, too wide for most

Cracker Jack wedding rings.

I read how some mammals never

forget their young—

their speckled spots, odd goat

cries, or birthmarks on curved

ivory tusks. There must be some

thread of magic there

cooling honey to stone—where

like recognizes like or how

a rib seeks its twin.

-------- 

We had rain forecast for a lot of the day on Saturday, so we tried to get out ahead of it -- we even missed the Orioles game, though Kate kept me in the loop -- but rain caught up with us at Juanita Bay Park, where we were otherwise having a lovely time watching the waves roll in and seeing turtles, eagles, ducks, bunnies, geese, gulls, ospreys, juncos, and various other animals, plus lots of different early summer flowers. Because of the forecast, there weren't many people, so it felt very serene even with the rain soaking us. 

 

We stopped at Safeway on the way home, watched the end of the Mariners game, had dinner, and now we're watching the start of the fourth season of The Boys, which is massively violent and wrong and excellent -- reminds me of old South Park when it was fearless, mixing in real-world people and politics -- name-checking The Masked Singer and Harry Potter! QAnon attackers who mistake Bat Mitzvahs for Zionist cabals! Vought on Ice doing "Put the Christ Back in Christmas" (and of course it ends in a bloodbath)! Still brilliant.

Lyrics for Friday and Kurt Cobain's Aberdeen

Serve the Servants 

By Kurt Cobain 

Teenage angst has paid off well

Now I'm bored and old

Self-appointed judges judge

More than they have sold

If she floats then she is not

A witch like we've thought

A down payment on another

One at Salem's lot

Serve the servants, oh no

Serve the servants, oh no

Serve the servants, oh no

Serve the servants

That legendary divorce is such a bore

As my bones grew they did hurt

They hurt really bad

I tried hard to have a father

But instead, I had a dad

I just want you to know that I

Don't hate you anymore

There is nothing I could say

That I haven't thought before

Serve the servants, oh no

Serve the servants, oh no

Serve the servants, oh no

Serve the servants

That legendary divorce is such a bore

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Friday was overcast and cooler than the rest of the week, but it was still a nice day for walking, and the beach wasn't as crowded as usual for an almost-weekend as a result. I had to do some unexciting things like folding laundry, but I also got to see ducklings and turtles and a frog, and any day with eagles singing outside my window is a good day. We also have local osprey now and Steller's jays. 

I watched Doctor Who with Cheryl (and may watch some Fourth Doctor before the season finale next week); I'm reserving judgment on it until I see how they plan to resolve things, but I loved a story about so many middle aged women. Then I watched most of the Orioles game with Kate (unfortunately with a rain delay and then an 11th inning loss). At least the Mariners won! 

Now we're watching the second half of Bridgerton's third season, which went somewhere I didn't expect based on where I thought they chickened out last season, and did not go somewhere I hoped they might, but maybe next season. (There can't be spoilers on the main romances, can there? Aren't they the whole point?) Here is Kurt Cobain's childhood home and the memorial park in Aberdeen: