FIRST DAY OF AUTUMN

we had a record amount of rainfall yesterday.  lovely weather that cleared and cleaned the air and  the streets.  for the first day of fall the weather turned sunny and cool.  the light has changed from fluorescent yellow to a golden umber.  despite some shit that cause the usual stresses re work and house [i've been on a stevens reading jag the past couple days trying to work out how he managed to be an executive and a bohemian and figured i can use a few lessons in those arts].

today i read a fantastic piece by kamau brathwaite published in HAMBONE #17 titled the namsetoura papers.  this particular issue was published in 2004.  at the time i subscribed to the journal.  i am quite shocked that i've had this journal for nearly 10 years now.  10 years have gone by that fast?!  brathwaite's INGLISH is published in a kind of font that does to text the way certain lighting and filters do to film.  this is a very cinematic writing that, in light of all of the stressors i've hinted at and are too mundane to discuss, held me in great delight.  brathwaite writes about the economic development of his home on barbados and his fight to keep his own land out of the hands of developers.  here the poet declares that the almond tree in his yard all 'but challenges me to po-ms & prose scriptions that i nvr finish.'

amen.  for i too feel that in my own life and writing that i go on but despite the lack go on to never finish.  it is the work of life/the life of work that is the next step never to be completed until the fragments are clipped together by that giant paperclip called death.  the ordinary struggles and extraordinary tumults of living carried forth by needs great and small.  let us continue in our endevours even if no one is listening for is not life itself the mark of terrible struggle?

furthermore life is the result of the desires of two people, your mother and father.  for if they never desired each other you would not be here.  it is luck that brings us together and brought us life.  let us raise a glass to that luck.

and if you think i've forgotten about my favorite holiday guess again.  halloween is a little over a month away.  i'll be doing my typical EVERYDAY IS HALLOWEEN posts beginning this week.  not everyday but when the mood strikes.  the countdown's begun.  soon we'll hear the pitter of trickortreaters's feets.  in the meantime, dig this first day of autumn wherever you live.