May 26, 2017

Yesterday I closed the windows and let the furnace come back on. Today it was back in season. Went before light to the Racquet Club, where I encountered Brent and realized that the agitation in me the last few days is at least in part sexual tension, which I hardly recognize as itself anymore. But, it is energizing, so it is welcome.  Painted well at the studio (sexual energy again?). Steve stopped me on my way out and observed that I had a huge gash in my tire. “Did you hit something?” he said. Yes indeed I had, in the darkness on the highway, but such is my nature that I didn’t check to see what damage was done, assuming that being allowed to keep moving was enough. So, unscheduled trip to Reece’s Tires. Here is the odd thing: the day was so beautiful, so perfect in peace and appearance that waiting for them to replace my tires was rather an opportunity for revery than an imposition. Watched a harvestman cross the concrete and find shelter in a crevasse. A man from Madison County struck up a conversation. I liked him immediately, as one likes someone who is, as near as is conceivable, one’s opposite. He rather looked like me–both of us blond and ruddy and small-- but his life was almost inconceivably unlike mine. If I hadn’t had context I might have misunderstood much of what he was saying– “tar” was “tire” and so on, but most of the things we discussed we could see, so it was well.  As ever, one reveled in the dramatic mountain-masculinity of the workers there. They stand very close to you, but look away so that the closeness is not off-putting. Their voices are low and calm, hardly above a growl. They move like powerful boys. They do not smile. They squat beside your car and contemplate its woes. What they do to men who like men is probably wholly unintended.

Invited to read for Best American Poetry 2017 in New York in September. I said “Yes.”

Theater last night, JC’s new play Malverse. The room was practically empty, but put it down to it being a Thursday night. The level of acting at the Magnetic approaches impeccable. JC wants to have coffee and discuss the play, so I paid morbid attention.