Day: January 21, 2014

I looked up at the dark sky tonight,

the sky sucking up all of the light,

the cold all of the warmth,

I saw Mother Earth winking at me,

your eye is so wise, I said,

hoping to win her favor, the eye keeps turning, turning,

needing to see me, demanding my attention,

why so cold? I finally blurted, it is  barely dusk,

and the black and the cold cutting through me,

dimming my spirit,

sending my poor animals into their stalls.

all you can do tonight, she hummed,

ending each word with a hint of a lisp,

is give them some grain, get them inside.

I am sorry for them, they are blameless

in our world, the only creatures who listen to God,

and follow his dreams.

You all ignore me, she said,

even you, you write your poems,

your words, take your photos,

you skate right by,

no better than the rest.

And she sighed,

and covered her heart with her hands,

folded them right across her chest,

What is more sovereign,

more pure and utterly alone,

she said, than God,

up here with me,

singing his beautiful and awful song.

 

Someone wrote me that all cats are heat-seeking missiles, I like that term and image.  Flo, the barn cat who got inside, is a scholar of cold. The thermometer did not make it to 0 and my face and eyes stung walking outside, Maria’s did also. Flo went to the door this morning, turned and headed for her stand, where she spent most of the day looking out the window and studying the bitter cold, it will be much worse tomorrow. Maria and I agreed they did not need to be outside today, nor tomorrow. I came and went all day, went to my study, went to town, went shopping, signed some books at Battenkill, Flo  sat glued to the window, a true student of cold weather, she seemed to greatly prefer this side of the window pane today.

Flo has retained all of her hunting skills, she usually nails a mouse when she is outside, she seems to eat them whole, a barn cat still at heart, a scholar of the cold. I like her approach to it, a deeply meditative state that is peaceful to watch.

The winter pasture was fierce and unrelenting today, the temperature never got below 0 on the farm, high winds and more arctic air will send the temperatures much longer, the pasture was a hard and unrelenting place today, at least for the humans – Red never seems to notice, his passion for his work is unwavering.  How, I wondered, can I capture the cold and barren feel of this place today, and then the sun appeared mysteriously up in the gray cold sky. It never seemed farther away.

Benjie White is one of the most interesting and important people in my town of Cambridge, many years ago he founded the Hubbard Hall Arts Center, the creative soul of my small but fiercely individualistic upstate New York town, the center saved and refurbished the beautiful old opera house and expanded to save and restore a number of freight depot buildings, the center stages plays, offers classes and scholarships in the arts. Hubbard Hall is an extraordinary civic achievement, White seems not all that interested in the new world of the Internet and modern media hype, I’ve never seen him on Facebook, Hubbard Hall is his child.

I teach there, it is one of the most remarkable things I’ve ever seen in a small town, Benjie White is retiring, leaving the position he held for so long. Benjie White is enigmatic, he is an actor and arts administrator, he is often out behind the Opera House sweeping the sidewalks and shoveling snow, he doesn’t say much, rarely smiles, he doesn’t too small talk, he is something of a legend here, his strong will created Hubbard Hall and kept it going through many hard times.  I know so little about him. I have seen him perform, and I know he is very gifted, he is responsible for Hubbard Hall, he is powerful and charismatic presence. I saw him at the Round House Cafe today and asked him if I could snap his portrait, he needs to be acknowledged, and I love the character in his face. Being an actor, he smiled as any professional would.

 

Random House sent me the proposed cover for my next book, out this fall, “Saving Simon: How A Rescue Donkey Taught Me The Meaning Of Compassion.” It’s my photo, and a good choice, I think, and I’m happy the story of Simon becomes a story of the meaning of compassion in all of it’s many different forms. I wanted to share it with you, it might change and morph in one way or another, but the Random House team likes it a lot, and that usually means it will happen. I like it too.

I am excited to be bringing the story of the donkey in general, and my story of Simon in particular, out in a book. Donkeys are ready to be discovered, they have been shunted to the side for too long, and Simon’s story turned out to be a powerful one in my life – his rescue, the road to Rocky, Florence, the Open Houses,  Red and Maria, and to our new lives at Bedlamfarm2.0.

Simon did not save me, an overused term in animal literature, he did teach me the meaning of compassion, and that is the narrative spine of this book.