While artificial snow fell softly

...in "Zero Built a Nest in My Navel," real snow fell with authority here. As people viewed Rondinone's picture of a raven taking a shower, I watched a real raven try to break into the neighbour's garbage can. While people considered Rondinone's haiku-like poems, I wondered if anyone was reading my poems. As people wondered about the type of wood he used, I thought about all the shafts of wood in the forest that surrounds me. The shafts of poems. It was then that someone drove an ATV into my yard, into the middle of my thought, its blade cutting into the very pile of snow at which I stared. That someone proceeded to clear the driveway. I don't know who it was.

I swear I saw

...more traffic in the past five minutes than I saw on the entire way here. And people. I'm not used to so many people. I lived in Saskatoon for a couple years a long time ago. It's a beautiful city.


Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to live in a city again. I thought about it tonight as a bagpiper marched through the restaurant, My Bonnie Lassie bouncing off the windows. All heads turned to the spectacle. I had just one thought. Tomorrow, as soon as it is light, I'm heading back north where I belong.

Road conditions weren't great

...this morning. We had to watch for pedestrians.



We had to pull over now and again.

And there was a rabbit loose in the car.

I should be working on a draft

...of a poem that I need to finish by 1 p.m. Saturday. Instead I did a quiz. I scored 5/10. Then I thought about the music, the notes that come after the end of the clips. I thought about inflatable palm trees, chocolate and expanding bellies. I thought about swings. I thought about the birthday poems I've written and how they're not exactly fit for a queen. That is, unless she likes limericks. Now I'm thinking about how I might fit into the Naked City.

I'll post again on Tuesday. I think.

Alone

...by Edgar Allen Poe.

A dog is howling east of here. That's nothing new. Sometimes I wake at night, startled, thinking someone is crying out for help, but once I manage to still my breathing I realize it's the poor dog going on and on. Sometimes I listen until I can almost see its breath curling up to the moon. The urge is always there to get up, pull on a parka and go sit with it. I'd like to think it would settle down, but maybe it would howl even more.

A poem which had been ripped apart

...has now been reunited.

Stick-to-itiveness

...might lead to success, but the term brings other things to mind. Do you have true grit? According to my perfect score on the Grit Scale, I do. Still, I feel like one of those flies.

The day seemed longer

...than usual. I painted. It went really well, then really poorly. Then I went to cast my vote. The painting got worse after that. However, thanks to the advice of two people, I figured it out and made it work. I finally left the studio at 8:00, not wanting to miss the election coverage. It was a close race in our riding.

This coyote looked into my eyes this morning

...and I looked back. It felt as if the coyote was looking around inside me. Searching. Going by the ample time it took, I'd like to think it didn't find too much to be concerned about. Just another curious human hiding behind a big lens.

I must get my hands

...on this book.

I spent part of the day in the studio, preparing to tackle new work. I haven't used oils for quite some time and I wanted to see how one of my oil paintings from the last series had aged, but I couldn't find it. However, among the canvases I found a pair of paintings that I'd forgotten about. What a nice surprise. I have them in my office now. I think I'll live with them for a while.

Today candidates discussed their arts platforms

...at the one and only pre-election forum on the arts.

Today's online reading

...included this haibun sequence and this poem. (Thanks to K for the poem link.)

And out of all the lit news I read today, the best was the bit where Atwood says writers have to encourage themselves.

Well, I must admit I checked out

... the second installment of A novel in a year, and I was especially pleased to learn that she's heard other novelists say they don't read other writers when they're working on a book. I've heard that, too, and it left me wondering. I can't imagine cutting myself off novels.

Iron Age hair gel

...sounds simple enough to make.

The existence

...of a universal aesthetic psychology.

Today I was reading Camille Paglia's Break, Blow, Burn while I biked. Then I went out and shoveled a ton of snow. My snow pile could be made into a nice sized quinzee.

On writers

...who blog.

To find out what happens

...when you take it too lightly, see the final paragraph.

I'd love to see

...this show. I can't imagine the effect A Primary Picture, The Diagonal of May 25 (to Constantin Brancusi), and
Monument 4 For Those Who Have Been Killed in Ambush (To P. K. Who Reminded Me About Death) would have on me in person.

This looks good too. I like the bit about nonfiction in the last paragraph.

I didn't know all

...this "tongue-twisting linguistic wrangling" had been going on. I didn't know this either. I could go on. But I do know the snow had more crunch today and all the sounds were almost too crisp. The sound of tires. Loaders clearing snow. Dogs barking. Ravens making those sounds they only make in January. And the chickadees. A boreal chickadee was arguing with a black-capped chickadee just before the sun peeked out, a wheezy voice versus a clear one. Wheezy, clear, wheezy, clear. The clouds quickly hid the sun again. I walked on. I didn't want to know which voice would be first to fall silent.

One note short

...of a cadenza. How do they know she lopped it off by mistake? I suppose the answer is a quick search away. It seems odd that someone so careful to get it right would accidentally lop off a note. Who knows, maybe she was startled by a bang on the door or maybe the cat jumped up on her shoulders when she wasn't expecting it. That happens to me all the time.

The mad scientist

...stereotype. Get a load of Lucy! Yikes.

I've always wondered

...why we yawn.

I spent the day studying poems. Tonight I watched the debate. I must admit I liked Layton's tie.

New Year's Day Polar Bear swimmers float

...their book choices. That's it. Everything's aquiver.

The sun finally appeared this afternoon. As soon as it happened, I took a chance and woke the cat from her beauty sleep, much to her annoyance, and carried her to a sunny spot. She quickly changed her tune and rolled around in the brightness. She fell asleep in the sun. I rushed outside.

It's hard to believe

...how much this story brightened my morning. It was so dark and gloomy when I crawled out of bed. I'm told the sun hasn't shown its face since Christmas.

A novel

...in a year. Hm.

What does art and a urinal

...have in common?

Ok, that's an odd story, but it's been an odd day. This morning I was told there would be a planned power outage on certain streets in town from 1:00-2:30, mine included, so I planned my day around it, getting nothing done in the end. I had planned to write. Anyhow, I left at about 1:30 to attend to other things, but the power still had not gone out. When I returned at 3:30 or so, the house was toasty and nothing was flashing. There was no outage here.

I read a ton of poetry

...before Christmas, but since then I've been reading novels. Harold Johnson's Back Track is up next.

I'll get back to the blog

...as soon as I finish Joel Hynes's Down to the Dirt. It's been a great read so far. I can hardly put it down, though I did just that for the world juniors medal games. How about Team Canada!

Crawling, pulling 18 boxes of chocolates

....on strings, the boxes gradually falling apart. I imagine the chocolates are falling out here and there. Ok. A lonely road can have sweet spots. Sadly enough, I can almost see myself crawling behind, filling my face.

Placism

...is a word I found in PG Arts 2006: Manifesto #1 on Rob Budde's blog. I like his idea of becoming more self-sufficient. Had I been with these writers, I would've talked about Budde's post, since I think placism just might be what makes their big question so chewy.

In 2006

...I will

a. spend even more time on my bike, book in hand and the tension cranked.

b. finally watch The Lord of the Rings. Yes, I read the book.

c. finish Bone Conduction.

d. complete the first draft of my novel.

e. all of the above.

As far as blogs go, in

..."The Year in Review - 2005" Alex Good says this: "For what it's worth, I think the blogs have probably peaked." For what it's worth, I think probably not. At least I hope not.

It was 1 a.m. when I finished

...reading my first novel of the year, but I wasn't really finished with it. He Drown She in the Sea made for a restless night. I kept dreaming its end and each time I woke up feeling bright and awake and ready to start the day. At 2:30, 3:30 and 4:30 the cat watched me pace in the living room. She joined me at the window to watch what the night was doing to the snow. All the while I wondered how Mootoo made it work. What is it about the writing that captured me? What is it about the end that left me unable to sleep? Why did it leave me feeling so rested? The cat stared at me until I finally let go of the questions. I went back to bed, leaving her in peace.