Love Letter to the Earth and Walt Whitman

  An on-line group I joined to explore our relationship with the Earth was given a project to write “A Love Letter to the Earth”. I didn’t want to do this and at first couldn’t quite explain why. I thought it was “blissy”, that is, emotionally sentimental. I have, like most people, written love letters…

Considering the Snail by Thom Gunn

  Considering the Snail   The snail pushes through a green night, for the grass is heavy with water and meets over the bright path he makes, where rain has darkened the earth’s dark. He moves in a wood of desire, pale antlers barely stirring as he hunts. I cannot tell what power is at…

In Time of Plague 2

  In Time of Plague 2. “We live in a mysterious world, a world that will not yield up its secrets either simply or by force. I’ll begin, therefore, by asking for a willingness to be complex. I don’t mean we should give up valuing simplicity, but recognize that one-sidedly simple critiques of the contemporary…

Goose Down Day (In Time of Plague)

Goose Down Day Cocooned under duck down goose down day mug of tea beside me nothing like April light gray shorts twisting as I turn on an elbow to half sit anger hard in my cock eyelids stuck no cough no fever throat a bit raw breathe deep think I can still smell my sweat…

In Time of Plague

“Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness. Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself. You are a child of the universe no less than the trees and the stars; you have a right to be here.”  (The Desiderata) It is the Christian season of Lent and just as I like to sing carols…

…that knack of opening: Thom Gunn

Odyseus and Hermes  by Thom Gunn It is amazing to find this poem I had never seen before in Thom Gunn’s collection “The Man with Night Sweats”.  The second line, “-beard scarcely visible on his chin-” is from his introductory quote from Homer on the opening page of his collection “Moly” written in 1971 (The…

Meeting Beetle: an encounter lost in a wood.

Meeting  Beetle: In my video on this blog called “Embracing Gaia Two” I mention a day at Schumacher College in Devon, UK. when I went for a long walk alone on the Dartington Estate. It lies on the edge of Dartmoor and the river Dart flows through it. For the first time in my life…

Walt Whitman’s Birthday

My dear friend Beth Philips reminded people on Facebook to-day that it was Whitman’s birthday so I posted the following:   Here are some (other) things to do on the day:    1. If you are feeling down or depressed read Whitman’s “Song of Myself” the first poem in “Leaves of Grass”. 2. Read a poem…