28/30

Finish it.
            ~ Don Draper

Put one finger down put the next finger down then begin again put one finger down put the next finger down this is how to be a writer in case you forget in case your mother molests you in your bed every night in case you do not learn to speak for twenty & seven years because you are slammed into yourself put one finger down put the next finger down then begin again this is how you fly when your mother throws your violin your books your records one pair of patched jeans & you into the yard into the street into the wolf world before you have even begun to bleed put one finger down put the next finger down then begin again in case your great left toe freezes & gets gangrene & falls off inside your boot while you are a homeless teenage girl in a brutal Spokane winter in case you live outside or in a boarded up building or under the bridge & all  you think about is pain day after day in case you get caught stealing cheese from a bin in the grocery store & police chase you in the parking lot & pin your girl body to the curb put one finger down put the next finger down then begin again in case you are thirteen years old with a limp & dirty hair & you go to a motel with a strange man to have a shower in exchange for sex put one finger down then put the next finger down record every word hold that man in your chest & all the other men & all the other showers & all the other knives in your warm body your soft folds forever put one finger down put the next finger down & begin again in case an eight year old boy who is squatting in a house with you takes LSD & screams & can’t stop screaming because he thinks he is going to die in the toilet & you don’t know what to do because you are a child & squatting in a house put one finger down put the next finger down play the keyboard like a stupid drum in case you marry at seventeen to escape the streets put one finger down put the next finger down then begin again in case you hear fire engines up the street on a Sunday morning in case you’re getting divorced again & moving to another house a haunted duplex that holds fleshy true injured children in case you have to move in the middle of the night with your infant son & your ex-husband lets your feral cat shoot out the door a cat named Fledge tiny & gray with stripes while you move books & records even after you warn him to be careful put one finger down put the next finger down in case you go to the old house at three in the morning every day for months calling Fledge sobbing her name even though the loss of Fledge is much worse than the loss of your husband put one finger down put the next finger down record it in case you need to make order of the senseless wolf world in case your brother has a child he never gets to see in case the boy was born in a dank ugly town then whisked away from your brother or you were whisked away so you never knew each other put one finger down put the next finger down in case your father moved to different state to start a brand new family with three brand new daughters but tells you he’s sorry he’s sorry he left you with her one month before his heart explodes & you lose him forever put one finger down put the next finger down if you want to be a writer in case you were raped in front of your own goddamned house in a familiar car put one finger down put the next finger down this is how you do it this is how to write open your mouth outside on a wintry day & see if birds don’t fly out see if they don’t fly right out riding your plumed breath cover your ears & open your mouth to hear birds whisper to one another this is how to do it one finger at a time moving over the waves that’s right now get up & scream your fool head off one finger one letter one word at a time.

Pig and farm report

 Stay
by Kevin Peterson

this national write a poem every day month has put me through the wringer emotionally mentally but I got 18 strong poems that I love I shook the worm can down to its dull aluminum bottom I tended the garden I danced I baked I hiked up and up then up further into the forest than I've gone since moving here I walked the beach at low tide I read all in all not bad one more to go and still I fell short two poems since I have one in my head for today it was an exercise in remembering for me an exercise in practicing the art of allowing myself to write crap an exercise in immediacy in art most importantly I remembered that I am a poet a writer something I had begun to doubt I quit FaceBook I jumped head first onto Twitter which is almost starting to feel like home to me all of this is good but this morning my brain is shut off it took me an hour to wake and I have still not fully come into the day it is the last of April it is raining and so I leave you with yesterday's potato selfie which is the most boring thing ever but to me they are beautiful to me they are spectacular such lush emeralds and it's still too cold to plant any of the vegetable starts I have tenderly grown and covered in the shed that houses my chainsaw shovels etc I think yes I think I just put myself to sleep goodnight Darklings

27/30

Sometimes it feels like drowning

Migrants at the border wall babies grandmothers gather gather America the Final Girl smashes the other crooked fell her obsessive draw America the Final Girl is Phillip who wears built up shoes his legs different lengths America the Final Girl is a prostitute on Aurora in pink thigh high pleather boots frantic holds out her cell phone afraid to get shot America the Final Girl is a six year old boy straddling the wall in white wrinkled cotton he left his bicycle his dog his father he chalks Jesu Christo on the pillar connecting radiating metal bars America the Final Girl is a red nosed pit bull tearing up the lawns sprinklers dance cages clanging Coca~Cola splashes her hot masturbating tongue America the Final Girl is children singing in frightened classrooms America the Final Girl is spinny and frantic America the Final Girl moves her feet brushes her hair tangles fortune with prayer cards grows terrible and wild and vain America the Final Girl crashes into bald a rat tail coiled under one wig or another

26/30

I could die of boredom or holster up my guns.

            ~ Don Draper

my eyes ache lightbulb filaments strangled delicate wires the plunge the slight insect noise I woke and grabbed my pink summer hat during the night woke again saw the hat on my dresser I have a desire to be more human fold my tail wings crooked tooth claws inward walk more upright inhabit this human body love and care for it as for a crippled animal brain on today full no quivers jerks or starts I cut my fingernails short short to practice Beethoven the tips bleed when I type I dreamed of the composer I have his stink on me the idea of breakfast of food sick I dig in the dirt lie under the stone bench untie my chrysalis the pus filled moon rolls around I wore a pink and gray diamond patterned cashmere sweater and gray wool slacks to my father’s funeral I was stoned argued with a fake-toothed preacher after leaving the apple maggot quarantine area I wrote Pickle Farm Road on my hand spectral and ignored in the gutters and margins all the notes now I know now I can run with it my eyes ache I’m going to bake cornbread

100% full

This is the Spectral Hot Honey Rag moon

25/30

Animalia

three deer down to Little River runoff this morning seal pup warmed himself on the docks while his mother rolled rollicked bobbled near the boats that floated into port with their catch down down to the tideflats jasmine honeysuckle sweet pea cedar smoke strong perfume great blue chewed a rubbery cross-eyed skate for an hour bit shook dropped it in the rocks picked it up again married eagles circled wings flapped skimmed the water’s surface in low tide I walk easy on the shore spider crabs are mine oysters blue-lipped clams jellyfish spread like hubcaps fried egg jellies zip the wake I watch listen drink coffee from a speckled tin cup given me by my father who was given it by his father his cup in these woods at this cusp we slurpslurp the moon hung ill day and night and day turkey vulture perched on an abandoned picnic table where I met the couple whose hands grow from their shoulders we spoke of cars and dogs shared my peanut butter sandwich once I washed my hair in a tide pool once I built illegal fires on the beach to keep my body warm once the ocean gave back immense noise and pressure tumbletossed me into a weird translucent hybrid three deer down to Little River runoff this morning the moon stayed in the sky day and night and day

In case you were curious or you like to bake

Pane Bianco

3 cups bread dough

2 teaspoons yeast

½ half teaspoon sugar

1 ¼ teaspoons salt

1 large egg

½ cup lukewarm milk

1/3^rd cup lukewarm water

3 tablespoons olive oil

¾ cup shredded Italian blend cheese (I added a cup)

½ cup oil-packed sundried tomatoes well drained and chopped (or cut with scissors)

3 to 6 cloves garlic peeled and minced (if you like garlic I don’t can no longer eat it so I use garlic salt before I roll it up)

1/3^rd cup chopped fresh basil

mix yeast sugar and milk and water in the bowl of your stand mixer let it proof for ten minutes

add the oil and egg and mix

add the flour and knead the dough for ten minutes with the dough hook of the mixer until dough is very soft you can do this by hand and sometimes I do if I want to beat something up

turn the dough into a buttered bowl butter the top of the dough and let it rise in a draft free spot for one hour or until the dough has doubled in size

gently deflate the dough then flatten and pat it into a 22” long and 8 ½“ wide or so rectangle I used my extra large Silapt and it was the perfect length for this dough and it makes clean up a snap I also use a large ruler for this part but I get funny that way in the kitchen

spread the cheese on the dough then the tomatoes then the basil don’t make it too heavy with toppings or the bread will break this can be kind of tricky so if you aren’t used to stuffed breads go cautiously the first time!

roll the dough up like you would roll cinnamon rolls

pinch the long seam shut

transfer the dough seam side down to a lightly greased sheet pan (I greased my regulation size Silpat for this but greased it first)

starting ½ inch in from one end of the log use kitchen shears to cut the log lengthwise down the center 1 inch deep and ½ inch from the other end

Still keeping the cut side up form the dough into an S shape

Tuck both ends under the center of the S to form a figure 8

Pinch the ends together to seal

Cover the loaf and let it rise in a draft free place until double 45 to 60 minutes

bake at 350 degrees for 40 minutes after 20 minutes tent the dough then finish baking (my oven runs hot so I first baked it at 370 then lowered to 360 for second 20 minutes) be very careful when you lift it off the baking sheet onto the cooling rack it is wobbly in the middle until it cools

this bread looks beautiful and it seems tricky but it actually is very easy and tasty especially the next day yum

24/30

Change the conversation.
            ~ Don Draper

my mother was a hoarder this is not a cautionary tale this is true my mother hoarded secrets my mother was a hoarder she hoarded held held on to everything except husbands except children my mother was a hoarder like the television show but worse my mother was a hoarder she hoarded Joan Rivers jewelry sweaters shoes pictures torn from magazines towels soap chips dirt dead animals secrets my mother was a hoarder we did not speak for a century when she was eighty and four I visited her house my mother was a hoarder like the television show which never reveals the smell the death linger the secrets my mother was a hoarder when she died at eighty and nine a dead apricot poodle discovered behind her refrigerator and the rest the rest my mother was a hoarder I do not watch the television show I know the smell my mother was a hoarder oh the smell a corpse floating in ditch water my mother was a hoarder she hoarded secrets bodies the smell a corpse floating in milk my mother was a hoarder worse than you can imagine narrow pathway through her house littered with dead mice dog shit on the table birds screaming from cages dander coating grease walls my mother was a hoarder kept corpses floating wet in her house with its perfectly manicured lawn my mother was a hoarder hoarded secrets hoarded her hubands hoarded her children hard enough to float them dead dead in sour pools of milk

I forgot to post this yesterday. I went to town to fill my car with gas.

Pig and farm report

Tuesday morning I woke to no Jupiter she has been on my bed as soon as I make the smallest noise for the past year and when she was not there and did not answer my call I panicked that maybe she had escaped outside which means either cat burglars came during the night and stole her or she learned how to pick locks from watching PBS then I thought she was lying stone cold and dead somewhere under the sofa maybe or in the kitchen I finally found her in the library stalking a wee mouse so I scurried back to bed to tuck my toes all the way under the covers until she had the wee mouse stunned and cornered but still breathing under one of her scratching posts in the living room I pushed the mouse into a jar covered the top with a piece of cardboard and dispatched it into the forest thank you kitty thank you sleek beautiful Jupiter thank you Animal Gods one and all

yesterday I felt sick all day the decrease of meds on the heels of the increase of meds left my stomach in an uproar so I read all day and did nothing else

today I went to the forest and hiked up the trail and saw this lovely young madrona sitting down to breakfast with the heron and the red-winged black birds whose song I now recognize all her lacy slips were showing from bark to red to lighter red to green oh these trees are so incredible

when I got home I weeded and mounded dirt in my potato bed the potatoes are growing at different rates as the sun moves toward summer but they are all healthy and greeny green and bountiful and my rows are crooked as my teeth as my fringe as my innards but still sun and water and they grow and I have carved out and tamed a small parcel of my forest and tomorrow I will prepare the other two beds for the rest of my garden

this afternoon I baked this pane bianco which is a white bread stuffed with three Italian cheeses sun-dried tomatoes garlic and fresh basil

as you can see it turned into Stuffed Treble Clef Bread and tonight I ate it warm right out of the oven with butter in fact I ate too much but by bog who can resist fresh bread seriously cannot and never have and now I am exhausted and here to say hello hello Darklings and to send my crooked love out over the airwaves to you and you and you and you and you

23/30

Stop writing for other writers.
            ~ Don Draper

I have to dance these April poems out wild in my house wearing my nightgown drum solos are best I have to dance like I danced in 1971 to the Beatles slow version of Revolution high on acid for hours in a kitchen on Pike Street I have to dance the words out because I only wrote two poems in a year & I stopped reading & now I have to dance in the forest I used to be fancy I used to show up I was city New York Portland Seattle San Francisco Alexandria Washington D.C. New Orleans Chicago fancy cities starting at thirteen when I escaped now I am a forest on an island I wear my stupid nightgown & red plaid wellingtons to water potatoes planted at spring’s beginning every morning I eat an apple & throw the core into the trees for black tail deer & rabbits every morning I stand outside eating an apple then I dance wild unfettered & I don’t show up & I don’t apologize my litany tegretol clonazepam temazepam ativan trazodone repeated every single day every single & I don’t apologize but sometimes I explain in my nightgown my red plaid wellingtons I explain to the madronas the pines the maples the wild roses the ground swell the salt air the deer the rabbits & I dance furious wild happy happy to push these words out on a page my fancy leaked through my hair my knees my breasts my years in the factory my fingertips my feet my hips & I won’t apologize

22/30

I know exactly what I want.
            ~ Don Draper

Dear Nadia flame on stage playing the Shostakovitch violin concerto dear Nadia blade slicing through airwaves dear Nadia I am wrecked on stage playing Shostakovitch sway bend music river undulating black dress thin vibrant blade I am wrecked it was once I did once I played Shostakovitch a blade in a black dress dear Nadia pressing notes hammering notes breathing notes in and out wave after wave notes riding the ceiling slicing the ceiling escaping into the sky above the concert hall the world the outer outer world the universe dear Nadia once I did I was wrecked on stage a blade cutting into the hall river swelling in me strong and thin once I was a oh Nadia I have forgot I am old I am forgot dear Nadia once I was a thin strong blade in a black dress playing the Shostakovitch violin concerto did you did you see me did you hear me there a river in the stained glass did you hear my body my blade slicing through the airwaves

21/30

Misery of the broken pie bird

I knew if I held the queen bee in my mouth I’d be stung let’s talk about the weather he was Leni Riefenstahl with a camera I was the German girl who baked clapped my hands flour flumed up did a swarm of bees fly into his mouth was he stung happiness permeated the house by the railroad tracks cedar stink creosote caked gumboots the washing machine groaned as embers flew down the chute under his collar burnt I married a man who worked the mines in Kellogg Idaho star-shaped coke scars marked territory on his neck his back he star-shaped scarred me alone in that house by the railroad tracks I canned tomatoes made jam ate carrots ripe in Coeur de’Alene dirt where Lark was buried where Grace was buried where my French grandfather cooked for a Japanese internment camp I grew cocaine thin hiked Tub Hill every season sank into my body my eyes glint and staring he star-shaped me whipped me seven then ten years a gift like breaking a horse such graceful devastation

Pig and farm report

my stomach did not ache the past two days but all the I did for the last entire 48 hours was lie on the sofa binge watching The Sopranos and eating I ate everything in the refrigerator then I ate everything in my cupboards then I ate everything in my pantry then I went outside and started grazing in the tall grass in my forest then I ate the holly berries which are yellow-turning-to-red then I ate the trees then I drank the sea

NO MORE TEGRETOL THANK YOU

I am going back to my normal dose the 200 mg a day dose not the 300 mg I took the past two weeks nor the 600 mg DOGNURSE thinks I should be taking nope no more done done done

this morning I woke and danced and remembered taking hula lessons with Diana and Pauline when we all worked in the factory at Fluke before I got married or pregnant and I remembered Diana and Pauline how the three of us were a closed circle how I had never had close women friends before that and have never had since then with the exception of the friends I've made here in the flat blue world but the three of us in those days were inseparable intense happy got married together had babies together Diana married my new husband's best friend Pauline had her baby the same day I had my son that close finally it was drugs that tore us apart and now religion separates Pauline and me and Diana is still in the drug world though I have emailed her however rarely as her email is sick and infected but my son still hangs out with her husband my ex husband's best friend so we do exchange cryptic messages

dancing brought that up especially the fact that I can still hula my hips still move my knees still work and for that I am grateful

this morning I walked into the forest and saw these bracken ferns unfurling and this red-winged black bird sitting on the top of a madrona he was chirping a small electronic chirp and with each chirp his tail feathers lifted then settled

Good morning Darklings we are past Evil Sunday and quite a way still from Good Friday it's 60 degrees and sunny here at Summer's End The Surfer is here to mow the lawn then I will gather the grass as mulch for my potatoes

Love to you especially you my new fledged girlfriends my circle of women here who keep me safe

*photos by Page Loudon and his Real Camera

19/30

This never happened.
            ~ Don Draper

My chemical fire hums when propane is forced through the pipes the pipes inside my walls whistle birds on fire when I turn on the heater elder madronas drip and burn fluorescent primeval sway the animal ship manic needle in my eyeball when we say medicine it is a red stigmata canvas when we say meds they are the guts of the cottage in the woods with the graham cracker door gumdrop windows where wolf crouches on the roof lick lick licking himself I choke at the worst possible moment smash the rabbit saint who gave his life for my glue the Palace of Versailles blisters in my shoes I want to tell you how my feet burn how bright steam rises from the dog’s bowl did I ever really dance in a sweet short dress flared at the hips did I prime did I tango?

Pig and farm report

yesterday I cleaned and polished and resealed all six of my granite counters then I dusted then I sneezed then I vacuumed the house entire then I did three loads of laundry and two loads of dishes then I danced around then I cleaned the toilets then I sat on the kitchen floor and cleaned them vinegar and water with one wet micro fiber towel in my right hand and one dry micro fiber towel in my left polishing along the grain of the wood getting every single inch of that floor gleaming then I realized it was four pm and I felt great I felt fantastic what with my upper body workout and dancing etc then I realized the reason I felt so great was because I had not taken my tegretol which was not exactly a mistake I wanted to get the house clean before my stomach laid me flat then I ate a bowl of macaroni noodles and my own marinara made from tomatoes I grew and canned last summer then at 5 pm I took the tegretol and at six on the nose my stomach started hurting but it only hurt for a couple of hours by that time the wind had knocked out my power so I went to sleep and of course woke at 4 am made coffee and started the fire and I sat here in the living room waiting for the sun to come up

this is again much boring reportage not real writing at all but I felt like I accomplished something and was able to take my time with it my house sapphire bright all the laundry folded everything in order it is a feeling of great satisfaction after living in a house that I was never really able to make clean

I turned on my computer early to read about another another another shooting this time in a Waffle House in Tennessee incomprehensible and I blame it as a trickle down effect from the White House

I have nothing interesting to say except oh how the kitchen light shone on those floors this morning and I put my winter coat on over my nightgown and walked out to the deck-of-pollen-and-sneeze-death and saw the Lyrid meteor shower at least fifteen of them shooting across the dark sky and if you read this far and got to this point I can truly tell you I was entranced and delighted and amazed I watched until my feet began to freeze inside my boots then I came in and stood by the fire with a cat at my side and I feel amazing

Love

when your stomach doesn't ache for the first time in a while and it's spring it's time for joyful abandoned dancing + deep cleaning including dusting which since I'm already sneezing why not and resealing my granite counters

ps. It turns out the gastroenterologist was right in prescribing his homespun remedy I have been eating two tablespoons of organic ground flax seed in a bit of Greek yogurt every single morning since about two weeks after he told me to (at first it was awful and painful but I was still sick) and while I don't always take the apple cider vinegar I have been craving and eating pickles and looked it up online the New Medical Dictionary For All Ills Real Or Imagined and the pickles are doing exactly what the apple cider vinegar does which is to put acid back in my stomach I really wish the gastroenterologist had explained all this to me at the time of our follow up appointment of  course as with most physicians in particular specialists I was treated as a three year old with no ability to comprehend anything beyond tying my shoes Oh hurry summer and warm so I can plant the rest of my garden and eat again straight from the earth thank you

Dear Darklings,
good morning from the forest dark and deep and bright it is cold and sunny here on the island I went outside to check on my potatoes my brave little bleeding heart that I transplanted from the other place which is blooming like mad and my winter jasmine which is finally blooming we are in the center of a windstorm which means I will be losing power probably on and off which is fine I am prepared it is morning and nothing hurts as I don't take my meds until afternoon though last night my stomach actually stopped hurting at 6 pm (I looked at the clock) so it only hurt for three or four hours which is progress all my inner selves say don't worry just give up the tegretol you'll be fine but I know my inner selves are big old liars hopefully the wind will blow some of the pollen off the deck and Sweet Lime I stood in the forest and stared up at the trees and marveled once again as I do every day every single day at the rare beauty of this place in which I have landed time to go write now to give it a shot to step up to it again just leaving a wee footprint here to say hello and to remind myself that it does get easier
Love

I walked all through the street fair which was basically just sad with vendors mostly selling stuff they sell at souvenir shops i.e. crap and surly clowns making balloons and curly fries and meaty meat meatolicious foodstuffs though I did buy a bracelet made from spoons actually made from Tupperware Rose pattern spoon handles from 1954 with a beautiful piece of turquoise in the center I have seen awful pieces of silverware jewelry and have never hankered after it on account of clunkiness but this piece is delicate and held together on the back with a strong magnet and a safety chain I took a picture of my hand wearing the bracelet but my hand looked hideous and old to myself which of course it is so here is a picture of another of this shop's pieces so you can get a good idea of it I had no idea that Tupperware made silverware and I admit that I love Tupperware with my whole girly heart and have only three pieces which I bought at the county fair I'm pleased as heck with this beautiful little bracelet which is so slender I can wear it with my watch easily without banging into anything

after the street fair I went to a very small cafe called The Lunchbox Diner and ate a sandwich with cream cheese avocados red onions sprouts and cucumbers on the most amazing piece of focaccia that tasted like freshly baked bread and when I paid at the counter I told the man who took my money how impressed I was with it and he got all beamy and told me he had made it just this morning I brought half of it home which I just ate which made my stomach hurt again again again because I waited until I got home to take my meds

so it goes

no poem today

dry

xo

Pig and farm report

Dear Darklings,
Yesterday I could not write oh god the fucking tegretol made it impossible made it impossible to do anything though I did walk through the forest again but I could not write could barely peel a banana and now my stomach aches and aches it is dreadful but it will pass hopefully soon today I am planning on going to the street fair in Mount Vernon which is 17 miles from me a beautiful drive through farms and rivers and cornfields yesterday I woke and thought a seagull had crapped on my grill cover so I walked out on the deck and realized the grill cover and the deck itself was entirely coated in pollen and I am so allergic to early spring pollen and have been taking benadryl for a couple maybe three weeks now and it dries me up but for some who the eff knows why reason gives me terrible dreams last night I stopped the benadryl and the dreams and now I am sneezing and snotting all over the place this morning I walked my back forest and said hello to Marylinn Magnolia which is getting taller but has yet to grow leaves and Figgy Pudding which is taller than I now with a beautiful green leaf unfurling at its tip top I avoided walking on the deck which is still covered in pollen but it's supposed to rain this afternoon good this is the most boring post ever but I need to type at least to keep in practice I had a lot of early-religious-training-guilt about not writing a poem yesterday but tegretol brain will not allow it today I'm going to rehash a blog post carve it into a poem which feels like cheating but is not if I can even type which is difficult as the letters zip around the page and my spelling has flown the coop the street fair begins at ten so I'm about to head out I will leave you with this sign which always makes me happy

Human Powered

and this sad photo of me in my gorgeous pink-spring coat and my sad Sear's men's pajamas which are literally falling off my hips

Love from the underworld of smashbrain

18/30

You’ve given every girl that wears your lipstick the gift of total ownership.
            ~ Don Draper

My 8mm family set my head feral my brother did something heartbreaking to a dog I told my sister if you’re going to hold the exorcism of a dyybuk or a slewy case of epilepsy why do it at night in a deserted mental hospital or derelict church & just because the windows are stained doesn't mean your flight will be holy doesn't guarantee you’ll crash through zoom sideways over the river glide above fishes & kids getting high on oxy under the bridge & just because I used my warning sister arguments until you pinched your eyes & chatted up the Virgin & told her about the records I stole & everyone’s presents that one Christmas & just because bees were elegant gods & your feet tiny princesses & your throat bright poison doesn’t mean the ground won’t come up real fast like Wile E. Coyote chasing the Road Runner only to meet a cliff that never existed to slam your body out of its green summer dress & strappy sandals & very best lace slip who even wears slips these days even during exorcisms & your hair spread it spread how it spread into wings & flapped hard enough to frighten frogs from our mother’s grimy mouth

Dispatch from the blacktail forest

Who and what I saw on my hike this morning:

my brain feels dull and dry as a two day old biscuit and my stomach aches and aches still I went in I went into the forest today no rain so far but the clouds are moving swift and sure

Love from the outer reaches

Pain Français from Julia Child's Mastering The Art of French Cooking Volume 2

Pig and farm report

Dear Darklings,

I am sorry I have been so lax on answering your comments. I have been increasing my dose of Tegretol back to its normal level and for some reason this makes my stomach hurt always it always does every single time I lower or upper my dose. I was having too many symptoms of depression mania and rapid cycling which is depression on top of mania which is NOT FUN. I am trying to sooth myself make the ache hurt less. Last night I dreamed the claymation version of Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer came into my little parcel of forest and was chanting slogans from 1917 Russian posters and these chants only went into womens' heads so yes there is dreaming with the increase as well. I did today go to the state park and walk the trails on account of finally one day one blessed day of very little to no rain. I heard the water sing along the trails where it runs through the trees and smelled the low tide and crunched clam shells under my boots. Tomorrow I'll walk the beach to the railroad tracks that run from a house into the sea if I can if the rain holds off. I made baguettes today and marinara from tomatoes I grew last summer but mostly I walked and tried not to think of my aching gut. It should loosen its grip on me in a week or so I hope I hope. Here is what I have named (yes DOGNURSE told me my ego is boundless she doesn't understand art especially poetry) the Fairy Trail for obvious reasons and a sheared tree with spectacular color. I took a photo of wild fiddle heads growing all over which I intend to forage tomorrow but the photo was fuzzy and rather embarrassing even for me. I'll be back when I can and when I can. Fresh bread fragrance is beckoning and the marinara is thick and delicious and I misspelled every other word in this post now that I am tumbling back into stupid.

Love,
Rebecca

17/30

You want to get on a plane just to get a glimpse of a woman’s thigh.
            ~ Don Draper

I was going to write about death will I see the magnolia I planted last spring grow tall strong as my boy I was going to write about death my obsession with portals death the definitive I was going to write about death how I bathed the elders as they died how the elders died from the feet up the two years I worked in a nursing home how they died alone this morning I hiked the beach at low tide a death smell forest trails water roared up their sides I was going to write about death when I saw the news a plane crashed a 737 fell out of the sky fell out kept falling kept falling I was going to write about death not a woman getting sucked out of an airplane window I was going to write about death not a plane crash a 737 an airplane I may have built I may have may have wired that engine I may have may have slung electricity across its fuselage I may have crimped and tied and knotted and bolted and tightened and polished its bright eerie wing I may have I may have 30 years in the factory I was going to write about death today but not this not this not this gleam bird that may have my fingerprints in its belly my breath whispered into its cold titanium mouth its skin I was going to write about death but my stomach lurched into my throat and won’t come won’t come won’t come down

NEWS!

My beloved book Radish King is being re-eased into the wild next year. Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize in 2006.

Radish King marks the first book of poems I've read that has made me want to call in for penicillin. These poems are marked off as "Poems That Burn" -- simultaneously a description and a warning label -- which seems just about right. Some of them probably burned coming out; certainly it's the case that they burn a little while you're reading them; many of the images and lines linger troublingly afterwards. Rebecca Loudon's second collection of poems frequently finds itself "On the Delirious Track," fascinated by "that lovely erotic flaw / (the importance of the lopsided)." And if her poems are disorienting and confusing, which they can be, their humor, rhythm, surprise, and obsessive repetitions can be mesmerizing.
~ Bookslut

Here is the original cover galley from a postcard I purchased from the indomitable Ken Brown

***runs around the house screaming with glee***

Pig and farm report

Other than those two guys fishing nothing happened. It’s still raining.

6/30

Tell me you’ve run past that stretch of highway for the past two weeks and not thought of me.
            ~ Don Draper

animal insistence turned my velvet body to leathery grit arms & legs clammy skin a breath off corporeal temperature shivering dog calm trudge pant & blunt I ate mercury as a child broken thermometers bright pools on the bedroom floor gums not yet black not yet turned a grand tolling in third grade a nun brought her most treasure oh treasured to school two foot long thermometer awarded her for a lifetime of forcing thermometers into childrens’ rectums she removed it from a velvet lined case passed it with Jesus care one child to the next & I dropped it shattered mercury globs silver animals wriggling toward a fairy-tale center I scooped them into my mouth I am about to die or win a great award a shivering dog inside me my brother is a marathon runner I am afraid of losing him I’d write you a letter if I thought it was okay you don’t ever have to write back my life swings onto the gridded macadam as a woman in the driver's seat turns smiles & waves she holds a cigarette a bottle of gin & a gun

My brother and I

15/30

Don’t forget—your wife’s in the boat—you’re on the shore.

            ~ Don Draper

When you’re supposed to have a storm & black thunderheads float by like one of Heinlein’s adult Martians & everything feels tight in its skin about to bust right out if you don’t get some kind of sign from the sky & your head burns waiting & you want to eat hot curry to tamp the burn but you’re in the forest & clouds are piling up & there’s a feeling in the air the sky ionized so strongly it could iron your father’s white cotton shirts in 3 seconds flat if only it would let loose & you start praying to whatever god is handy the god of Wednesday the god of Tuesday Weld the god of Narnia the god of bad art the god of unread books the god of your goddamn too small server the god of the broken printer the god of hospital cafeteria smells the god of loose change the god of one hour martinizing & of course Beethoven that the whole mess would just pop but it doesn't it’s a balloon in your stomach it’s full of helium & it keeps filling with helium & there’s a lot of space & it’s filling quick but none of it does any good because the damned sky won’t open & everything & everyone is waiting?

Pig and farm report

I am tired of the rain still I walked outside in my red rubber boots to check on the lilacs (still lilacing their way open) and the potatoes (still growing like potatoes exactly as they're supposed to grow) and the state of the forest (a mess I need to get out with my chainsaw and make sure no trees are leaning on other trees misbehaving) but I am tired of the rain I woke up and my first thought was I need a nap not even the deer or bunnies have arove

I want to bake but I don't want to bake

I can't believe we're at war with Syria I can't believe last week he announced we're pulling our troops out of Syria and then last night or yesterday morning in Syria he bombed and missed or ignored the chance to take out Bashar al-Assad then bragged on Twitter "Mission Accomplished" and we all remember how well that worked for George Bush and without going through congress I have never spent so much time watching CNN what what what the fuck what the fuck I believe he did this to take the news off his own complete mess of a life his way of obstructing his way of attempting to throw fairy dust on us so we'll forget his criminal behavior this is unfuckingbeliveable and I remember Nixon's Whitehouse

fuck this president

sorry you know I don't make political comments here but what the fuck seriously

I'm going to the beach

14/30

Don’t stop until you see the whites of his pockets.
            ~ Don Draper

falling is constant failing Alice down the rabbit hole incised seeping blood infected what is happening there skin burnt pain pulling through narcotics profound sleep the body dying not from the feet up politely but from the head down my head hitting my stomach sick & traveling in little boxcars to my extremities made stiff narcoleptic numbness stupor an attack seizure this is not my quest how do people live in pain all the time how cut open tenders gurgle out the surgeon asked have you had trouble with anesthesia I tell him about the amputation how I woke & said why is there blood everywhere before I heard you’re not supposed to be here this is not my quest I know nothing nothing I listened to a baseball game on the radio today a radio from the early 60s heavy brown leather boxy my hair is clean I told the doctors mice have chewed through the wires & clouds are serious mobsters throb throb throb a steady heart lives in my feet

I don't give a flying fuck about this poem
I don't love it
This poem felt like zero while I was writing it
I deleted yesterday's poem this morning because it felt like it was holding a match to my crazy which now sounds crazy to me as I write it

12/30

It’s like eating a mermaid.
            ~ Don Draper

girls love all girls love lovelove pink glitterdeep cuts razor thigh speakforth new shiny guttermouth push strong happy blood crave blood taste blood old women bloody show post post post past women fold into themselves where are your heroes girls blood girls scrape scabs sing in tiny cars a secret I do not bleed goddamn done soft soft body warm I lick my palms absorb tell secrets taken & take my hair white pure white blazes in furious rooms I blaze I answer I know I ride I curry I repair I build I master I bore I birthed I rose in this my surge oh darlings slipslip the bit of trying let wind slap your thighs on storm nights this ten fold & bright alien stars shine through your dresswhitedress young girls bleed on white skirts fly blood banners kiss your women friends on the mouth holy kisses secret delicious last night a bolt of thick red silk wound itself around my body my firebrand now blood has gone fire in me & we begin again never think me ancient you will cry for your mother this is the way it is

Furious joyful abandoned dancing to Tommy this morning Keith Moon lives on in my heart like Jesus.

11/30

You want me to bring home what I got at the office today? I’ll put you through that window.
            ~ Don Draper

           

seventeen I crawled through the duplex window into Wayne’s bed the rotten middle his fists all night I screamed ran down the street screaming neighbors called the po the po the police who knew Wayne I crawled into him what I expected love he called me love his fists all night I screamed ran down the street bruised black eyes broke broken so broken rib I thought this normal my normal three no four no three no four years the rotten middle his fists I a girl running screaming down the street every other night police sirens again again again no job no car a girl screaming running down the street waiting for the po the po the police who knew Wayne my normal the rotten middle his fists I a girl running down the street screaming Wayne the po the po the police knew his name knew my name the girl running down the street screaming all night screaming & screaming & screaming

Pig and farm report

Dear Darklings,

these poems I'm writing after a long absence from writing poetry I have to furious dance to shake whatever ghosts inhabit my body before I can write them and I have to have absolute silence and I have to be completely alone while I'm writing them now I am warmed up according to my watch that watches I danced furiously for 28 minutes today in spite of a sharp pain in my right knee this morning which now feels loose and full of brand new blood I have lost weight since I moved here a year and 3 months ago not at all from sickness but from happiness from walking from swimming from gardening from horseback riding from an abundance of fresh produce from a lack of restaurants fast food or otherwise without at least a half hour drive and from happiness again most of all happiness and now it is easy to move my body as I did in the olden days and I am filled with joy because there I am a young self inside my elder body but the poems refuse to escape unless I move like that so they are the most physical poems I have ever written literally ever today I am waiting for my son to leave he came yesterday to guard my PTSD from the Cable Guy who turned out to be sweet and nice and funny and he wore giant paper booties on his shoes like a physician going into surgery and his name was Anthony and he set me up with a new speedy fast router and he changed all the settings on all my computers big and small and he scratched Jupiter behind her ears and laughed when I called Jupiter you big ho because well I had no idea how she'd do with strangers because there have been virtually no strangers in my house since last April when I adopted her and after and during and after my stomach curled into a tight knot and ached and ached and ached deep into the night 

I keep remembering DOGNURSE blowing me off when I complained about my PTSD saying oh don't we all have it now as I was trying to tell her that I literally hid in my closet when anyone anyone at all knocked at my door I could no longer trust her and have not trusted her since and once I find a new improved psychiatrist I'm going to tell her how deeply her off-hand comment affected me

the great blue heron was in the reeds this morning his long dangerous stunning beak tucked into his chest feathers also I have been watching the alpacas during storms they huddle in and as soon as the storm passes they spread out and they are adorable this morning I saw 19 horses and one foal who turned out to be a brown goat in other news the wind is up again and the rain and it blew all kinds of crap into my immaculate garden but the spuds are up! in spite of the storm! well done little potatoes I will love you with my whole heart and eat you with butter and salt amen

Love also

TATER LOVE!

more harry

I have avoided listening to this record for years because it is so intensely personal such a deep part of my body my history

now it is okay it's beautiful and enchanting and magic as it was when I first heard it in 1971 this feels like progress to me a sort of progress like cleaning out a cupboard the holds cherished things that hasn't been opened for 89 years

Pretzel on a bee plate.

still waiting for the cable innerlube guy and feeling CAF

I'm an old forgotten railroad ~ Harry Nilsson

panic baking (pretzels) interspersed with furious dancing to Nilsson Schmilsson then I lie on the floor for a bit then I start all over this my second day of furious dancing now to Harry and I'm quite surprised I didn't break anything on account of it yesterday and now I have discovered the meaning of the outer outer room it's for writing and for furious dancing lots of room yes a little crazy this morning buttery yeasty and warmed up

we never thought it would end

ps.

Lilac babies in spite of everything!

Pig and farm report

I took that photo at my beach yesterday the same Great Blue Heron who is there every single day along with his buddies his cohorts in crime the two red-winged blackbirds though Blue usually flies away when I approach him the frogs were in fine voice as well and today more and more and more rain and panic over my commitment to writing too much and ultra-panic over the internet people coming here coming actually into my house to check my stuff which feels extremely invasive because I'm slightly insane and extremely reclusive I called my son and told him to please come over and he will I'm not sure I want to wade through the ocean outside my door I'm not sure I want to even take off my nightgown the rain won't stop and the sun won't shine and etc my own bluesy song though I am not blue but worried about The Invasion of My Private Space honestly Alice is the only visitor I've ever had except for the consumptive Mr and Mrs Jehova's Witness who came in when I first moved here delicately coughing up blood into their respective hankies I think I'll bake today that will take the sting out of O death where is thy sting and maybe I should swim to the beach anyway maybe I'll see a whale or maybe I'll name the Great Blue who let me approach in my heavy human feet

Good morning Darklings do you long for summer?

Love

10/30

During the depression, I saw somebody throw a loaf of bread off a truck.

~ Don Draper

I poverty’s whore the government’s hand snaked down my thigh busted eyes layered in violent postures sucked my underlip my thumb first in the office where New Lady was being trained I spoke my need wept then she wept while offering me shampoo in a dish detergent bottle an unwrapped roll of toilet paper a soggy ham sandwich I told her it’s okay I’m crazy it’s okay in line for the urine soaked food bank forced to prove my meagre exposed my brain’s zippity doo dah aquanet Christian children handed out samples of macaroni dressed in off-brand peanut butter at the door would you like the recipe it’s macaroni and off brand peanut butter three rotten potatoes a leaking rice bag discarded individual fruit pies then in the Social Security office How many how many years did you work? Have you ever gone by another name what about 1981 we have no record of you then.  I rocked the entire row of welded chairs panic needled my teeth gashed my wrist never never water splashed the backwhip the moment I opened the moment I stuck out my tongue ahhhh-ed to prove my dis my able my mental ill terror biled up as the woman behind bullet proof glass shrieked Prove it! Prove it! schoolyard taunt a sodden loaf heels busted open on the hawk torn down

9/30

It was a dead man’s hat. 
            ~ Don Draper

7 horses behind the house in the Spokane valley brother & I  2 & 3 or 3 & 4 or 4 & 5 every morning he dared he dared me to touch the electric zzzz the electric fence with an apple or a piece of hay every time I did what he asked thrown to the ground by shock soaked in wet mud every day he said here touch it feed the horse let’s feed the horses let’s be cowboys my thin arms yanked back inside my body apple rising a lark’s feather into dry summer air on the ground I thrashed bawled shhhhh or you will you will get it shhhhh every day zapped my entire thrown & curled on the ground a wet mud fractal brother dared he dared me every day I touched the fence my entire being flung to earth as horses the gods of my contained world watched from above giant heads lowered in compassion