The sun rises in spite of everything

Today was a good rainy day here. It had been a very dry October, but we’ve had rain three of the four days so for in November. It’s also been warm, so tornado warnings are happening southwest of here.

Sunday was a bean day, ham and beans to be more precise, with lots of onion and a host of spices, and some gorgeous beans my cousin gave me last week. These came from a business in Dove Creek Colorado (a town that used to list itself as the Pinto Bean Capital of the World) which I drove through as a shortcut on the way to Oregon from Blanca Colorado. Years ago. Decades. Anyway, an easy meal to prep and let cook all day.

Saturday I spent a good part of the morning in Saint Louis workshopping poems at the Central Library a gorgeous library built after the World’s Fair in 1904. Following the meeting of the poets we were given a tour of the library and got some of the history and what happened during a renovation that was completed in 2012. My favorite bit was when it opened in 1912 and Andrew Carnegie came to visit (it is a Carnegie Library) he was offended by the opulence, the money spent to create such a grand design.

Friday I had my third test in my math class and got another perfect score. It is work, but it is no longer intimidating. And Jerry came home Friday from his week away in New York. He missed Halloween and the night before when I believe I was visited by the spirit of the orange tabby, Comet; she came on an odor of tuna breath.

And here we are the night before the election, having voted two weeks ago, I’m ready to spend tomorrow listening to Bad Bunny and working on polynomials, and poetry and an Eavan Boland essay collection Citizen Poet which has just been released.

And because it is needed here's this lovely poem by Derek Mahon:


Everything Is Going to Be All Right 

How should I not be glad to contemplate
the clouds clearing beyond the dormer window
and a high tide reflected on the ceiling?
There will be dying, there will be dying,
but there is no need to go into that.
The poems flow from the hand unbidden
and the hidden source is the watchful heart.
The sun rises in spite of everything
and the far cities are beautiful and bright.
I lie here in a riot of sunlight
watching the day break and the clouds flying.
Everything is going to be all right.