fieldnotes 2.19.17

Vow

I am aiming for that silent face.
Can I force it in spite of this outpouring?
This pulling of a too-early spring?

Here it comes again —
how it got beyond us before we knew.

Even when we’re not looking,
it points to pieces that don’t fit.

We just have to hold on and hope for the best.
Those gods truly don’t care where we go when we’re gone.

2.16.17
(41/30)

less warm but still warmer than it oughta be. ‘and we’ll join the Venture and the Morning Star’ 2 canada geese. pied-billed grebe. already? a noisy downy woodpecker. and a redbellied. runningman says ‘get those summer clothes out of mothballs’ robins. need to relieve a pressure, but. warming. warming. how long can i hold this up? again with the unnecessary and then again with the unmentionable. fuck am i mulish when i wanna be. dull but not. weeds catch light like antique gold. all of the birds. ‘your beautiful heart’ canada geese and robins and robins. chickadees. cardinal. goldfinches. we sing. up one, two – then down a third for one more round and still soon — ‘this reef around me’ nothing on the pond. two kingfishers fly over. an owl-lover from geneva. a cardinal.

2.19.17
(68/37)

redbellied woodpeckers. suddenly there are redwing blackbirds singing everywhere. there are sandhill cranes! guess i shoulda put two and two together when all those ducks started showing up. migration well under way. redwings everywhere. cardinals getting into their mating behavior now. it is not a thing you do on purpose, but that doesn’t mean it’s going to be painless. you shouldn’t see a shimmer of heat haze in february. you just shouldn’t. canada geese and mallards from the north overlook. nuthatches in the woods.

Notes:
Quote 1: (‘Venture, Morning Star’): Joan Shelley / ‘Siren’ from Ginko (2012)
Quote 2: (“heart”): Nick Cave / ‘And No More Shall We Part’ from No More Shall We Part (2001)
Quote 3: (“reef”): Joni Mitchell / ‘Lesson in Survival’ from For the Roses (1972)

about fieldnotes

fieldnotes was written at the Marsh beginning Sept. 26, 2016 and ending near the same time in the following year, collected in memo books over the course of many rambling walks.
Beginning on Sept. 26, 2019, three years after the writing, fieldnotes will be published in its entirety, with posts appearing as the corresponding write-dates occur.
(at least to the best of my ability)