& it's all i can do
to hold my breath
& hope this, too, will pass

oh, i am a very young child sometimes!
& like arianna told me,
childhood is a strange country.

"The written word is weak. Many people prefer life to it."
Annie Dillard

It is not that the summer is so uninteresting that I have nothing to write; it is only that I am living, that I am breathing, that I am recording with my eyes and ears and nose and not with my pen and scrolls.

Cherries ended, I thinned the apples, and peaches start tomorrow. I live my life in seasons, in waiting and biding and breathing and releasing. So here I am, 5 weeks in and 5 weeks out. I've been working lot, to be honest. Cutting weeds and pruning and picking fruit and rooting out flower beds, moving the winter's firewood and cleaning windows and walls. My back aches and my body is tired, my arms are tanned and strong. I fall asleep easily at night, going to bed late and rising early because this is summer, and this is the north, and you can't miss all this daylight and sunshine.

We take moonlit walks and we share fresh fruit and longboard in the late nights. I read a lot.

A little girl drowned Friday night. A best friend's niece. So death touches the circle, always and ever at the lapping fringes. And it's true, we don't know what to say. I don't know what to write in summers like this, in beauty and pain and freshness like this. Life is too real for my silly poems. I used to eat storebought fruit and think it was good, but since trying the local and picking it myself, I can never go back (and is this like life?).

And I don't know when I ever chose to give away my heart, but somehow the North, the earth itself, holds my heart, holds all of me in its beauty and its unpredictability. And I tremble.

oh!
& you should know, that besides your carpenter hands and the way you call all grocers "the market,"
my favorite thing about you is not that you know the names of so many different woods,
or even that you listen thoughtfully and speak with sensitivity
(all of these being things i like very much, & would like to adopt, myself)
no, my favorite thing about you is your sincerity
so if you want a little honesty from me
(a little secret poem you'll never see)
here it is, sincerely.

Apologies for the lack of thoughtful blogging the past couple of weeks. I just caught up on reading everyone's, so progress is being made.

What to say. The tiger lilies are in bloom--I left on Thursday for Bellingham and they were still all closed up; I came back late Sunday night and pink, yellow, orange blossoms are bursting all over town and in our flowerbeds. They unfolded while I was gone. Tiger lilies have long been my favorite.

Been reading a lot of Mary Oliver, some Salinger and Wendell Berry and Billy Collins. Been listening to the new Sigur Ros and old Wilco. Been longboarding and started picking cherries today at the orchard.

Found a bike yesterday: a red road bike for free, abandoned in a barn. I cleaned it and put air in the tires and can ride it, now. A happy find.

I don't have much to write at the moment, but am doing some private writing on my own, so I will get back in the groove soon. You should maybe know that July is my favorite month, I think. You should enjoy it with me.

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