So many wonderful papers that Saturday of the conference and the presentations went long all day and into the evening, an hour apiece with q&a, and I listened hard as hard as I could for as long as I could, for it is hard to go home as we did to show what you know and wish you knew better, but maybe harder yet to gather together so many wonderful people in the same room at the same time to think about Coleridge and Kant and Carlyle and Austin and Byron and Shelley and Wordsworth, of all things
not among things you think about everyday, unless: well, Karen Swann mentioned she lost two years
of her life as a grad student wandering the notebooks of Coleridge, and I remembered my mentor--also her mentor--Reeve--saying to me for some mysterious reason, stay away from Coleridge especially the notebooks, and I did though I didn't want to after that, I mean
what but the notebooks after that?
***
Reeve and Cynthia, thank you for the homecoming. No really, I mean it.
***
After, between the conference dinner at the home of Jonathan Culler and Cynthia Chase and martinis at Willow with all the folks from Soon Productions,
Kevin Elliott and Chris Nealon gave their poetry readings downtown and knocked my socks off. Was so glad to meet Kevin at last, to hear his poems aloud and to have Aaron Tieger's gorgeous broadsides in hand when Kevin read his final poem. Nealon is a master ventriloquist of voice and damned funny. Kevin is Musician and Myth-Maker--very fine indeed. Was honored to receive his invitation to make tamales for his cooking circle (actually he said "I don't take no for an answer")--which is also Karen and Theo's cooking circle--knowing, especially, that these folks don't mess around. They know food
is beautiful. So in the old way, I had a tamale party at Theo's house on the following Wednesday. What you might not know is that Josh and Emily moved into the downstairs apartment of my house about a year before I left Ithaca for Galesburg. I was their upstairs neighbor who shared the backyard garden I miss a lot before I left my place to Theo--thank you, Theo, for having me, us, in your home, my once home, for tamales. It was lovely, and you are lovely. --So Josh, now Theo's downstairs neighbor--was there to deliver in person a copy of Fourier Series, which is gorgeous, and Kevin and Kate showed, and Karen and Jerry, and Ann. My grandmother's pork tamales are impossible to share with most people I now know, so I've developed a vegetarian rendition. Oh, the secret insides of tamales. Chipotles, tiny diced potatoes, feta, and a single green olive with a red pimento eye.
Had a few too many with Theo. She put me up for the night on her couch where my old blue couch used to be.
***
Karen cooked for me all week, amazing food. I learned about greens this week. Dark leafy greens. Apparently spinach isn't as wellness as I thought. I loved staying in your house, in Jerry's study. Thank you, Karen. Thank you Jerry. Oh, and Jerry? I raided your iTunes while you were away. Baby.
***
Neglecting You. Sorry You! But I've got notes in my head I want to write to You. Rick, Suzanne, Cynthia, You especially, and soon.
***
Weird thing: Aaron Tieger's fiancee, Wendy Hyman, is an old good friend of mine from Smith College. How long did it take me to figure it out, this connection? Embarrassing. Had to admit my embarrassment. Was forgiven. Was invited over for tea and cats. If not Coleridge's notebooks, then tea and cats. Was given hope that whatever hope I can find
in life that is good is negotiable.
***
And forgot to say, I got my own copy of Carve. Wendy did the cover.
***
Drove home tonight. The road was a middle road. Watched the sun go down on one half of the world while the other half went dark and I thought, if I were the sort of person to look for God I'd think of souls in the wounded half closing their shoulders against the turning light. But the star hanging low in the sky tonight? Like a wasp. The radio towers blinked red, the tail lights of the trucks ahead blinked red and steady, and the wasp-green light in the sky, I thought, was like one of the barn lights in the distance. Green, steady. Fly me a plane or else give me a planet hanging low and close, wasp bright. Driving home, the first sting of the night. The one draping its back legs into my view.
***
No. The sun went down. The clouds turned orange and blue. It was dark. I thought: if only I believed in something.
Well, I do. But I don't know what.
