#NewThisDay Writing From My Photo Stream

You are made of almost nothing
But of enough
To be great eyes
And diaphanous double vans;
To be ceaseless movement,
Unending hunger,
Grappling love. . .

Excerpt from ‘The Dragonfly,” by Louise Bogan

I am woken at 5:45 a.m. by a cheerful daughter. She is inviting me for a swim to see the eagle and the morning mist on the pond. She makes my coffee. We have a beautiful swim around the island, with the eagle. The water is flat and warm. The air is cool. After swim, I go to do a big shop at the supermarket. I start, late morning, to try and work on a poem but I get interrupted by a call from my sister and go outside to walk around. The afternoon I spend outdoors, watering the transplants, and finishing the transplants. Frank and I work together. He moves the magnolia shrub that was too large for me to handle. After five years, the vegetable garden is gone. Frank is putting in a tennis and pickleball court where the vegetable garden was. I am taking a rest in the sun, late afternoon, when Frank asks me to hold his ladder. He is trimming trees with a chain saw over the place where the garden was. This makes me quite nervous, but he is determined. He’s going to do it no matter what. So I hold the ladder and my breath. He gets the limbs down and I realize I am not going to nap. We clear brush and clean up all his trimmings and I am glad to be helping him with his new project in my small way. He appreciates my help and I’m relieved when the chain saw is back in the garage. The vegetable garden was a wonderful five year experience. Wave loved his sandbox. The land is ready for a new use and we have found homes for all the perennials and the boxes of vegetables. The birds and bees and butterflies will find their plants in new spots and all will be well. Today, in the garden, I found myself missing wind. It seems weeks, maybe more, since I have felt a good wind blowing through the yard shaking the trees and the chimes. And me. Wind soon enough in the autumn. I am grateful for the stillness of August.