All morning a dazy funk, something about the light (oppressive, shifting in and out of a murk that feels too bright and too dark at once) and about sleeping too much, though I was too tired to rise with the alarm. Dreamt of being back at Bread Loaf but without the trees. White corridors, spare white dormitory rooms, an appointment with someone I was to meet but kept missing. No one I really know or met in Vermont. The whole day feels that way. A missed appointment. A missed deadline, opportunity. What have I done? The kiddos are pre-enrolled, met with them all day, am now done and feeling the next wave of things that ought to get done immediately. I am deleting email I either did or did not deal with months ago. Delete the whole box. That'll fix it.
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Zali walked into my office this morning, a surprise. It's been three years since I've seen him and I didn't know when he'd arrive to teach this term. We went for coffee but it's Labor Day and all the coffee places are closed, so we went to Coney Island and bought cokes and sat under a red and white umbrella and watched the parade dissipate and talked about fantasy: poetry, dreaming, faith, secularism, dada, the annunciation notebook. My friend, all the way here from Israel, my friend my friend it's a thrill to hear you think aloud again.
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Why is my head not working??
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--neither shadow of turning.
Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from
the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.--James 1:17
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