November 24, 2020

Drove to Fred Anderson Toyota to get the damage to the car’s undercarriage seen to. Turns out the fuel tank cover was ripped to pieces by my running over something, I can’t think now what. Diagnosis today, repair tomorrow. Sat in the waiting room, wrote a little, then read Poets in Their Youth. I never thought either Delmore or John B that interesting as poets. Perhaps their fame was set because they were at Harvard. The difference between contemporary poets and poets of the past (so far as I judge) is that actual achievement, actual quality in the work, has little relationship to the renown of the contemporary poet. Since I was already almost there, drove to the Parkway and hiked up the MST, from just north of the French Broad bridge northward. Almost no old-growth forest, except on the sides of mountains, anywhere I’ve hiked this fall. Yet again achieved my steps goal, and passed it. Fourth time, I think, three times in two weeks. Counter tenors one after the other on Youtube.