Thursday Poetry and

My computer has been taking a nice little vacation with Apple but it's back now. Just in time for my forthcoming unemployment (last day of work is Tuesday). So it's not surprising that this has not been my best week in recent memory. And the next few probably won't be much better, fun though job hunting is. And right this instant there's a fairly icky looking oreo cake on the television. Does anyone honestly believe you can get a half-way decent 3 course meal for $12.99. I suppose if they do, then they should head to Fridays.

In other news I'm going make these this weekend:

So I might be unemployed but I will at least have a roommate who's happy with me. And can manage it without trekking across town in the cold.

Anyway, on to the poetry...


MY MOTHER ON AN EVENING IN LATE SUMMER
Mark Strand

1
When the moon appears
and a few wind-stricken barns stand out
in the low-domed hills
and shine with a light
that is veiled and dust-filled
and that floats upon the fields,
my mother, with her hair in a bun,
her face in shadow, and the smoke
from their cigarette coiling close
to the faint yellow sheen of her dress,
stands near the house
and watches the seepage of late light
down through the sedges
the last gray islands of cloud
taken from view, and the wind
ruffling the moon's ash-colored coat
on the black bay.

2
Soon the house, with its shades drawn closed, will send
small carpets of lampglow
into the haze and the bay
will begin its loud heaving
and the pines, frayed finials
climbing the hill, will seem to graze
the dim cinders of heaven.
And my mother will stare into the starlanes,
the endless tunnels of nothing,
and as she gazes,
under the hour's spell,
she will think how we yield each night
to the soundless storms of decay
that tear at the folding flesh,
and she will not know
why she is here
or what she is prisoner of
if not the conditions of love that brought her to this.


3
My mother will go indoors
and the fields, the bare stones
will drift in peace, small creatures --
the mouse and the swift -- will sleep
at opposite ends of the house.
Only the cricket will be up,
repeating its one shrill note
to the rotten boards of the porch,
to the rusted screens, to the air, to the rimless dark,
to the sea that keeps to itself.
Why should my mother awake?
The earth is not yet a garden
about to be turned. The stars
are not yet bells that ring
at night for the lost.
It is much too late.

It's about as far from late summer as you can get of course, but there you go.