An Impossible Standard

What am I in this instant?  I'm a typewriter making the dry keys echo in the dark, humid dawn. I haven't been human for a long time.

(Clarice Lispector, The Stream of Life)

And this week?  Has been a week of abundance, blooms.  Offerings. Good showers of rain followed by the mystery of light on clean, new leaves.  The littlest birds singing the prettiest songs.  The world green (and yes, disarming).  But I did not write enough, or type enough in the dark humid dawn, or read enough and so maybe that is why there were also moments of profound loneliness. If loneliness is the right word.

I won't forget that there have been small lovely moments lately, such as learning that the sublime Ariel Gordon has included Calm Things in her list of night table recommendations.  I heartily recommend her first book of poetry, Hump.   I've had the pleasure of hearing her read poems from it on two occasions, and can tell you that it is in turns tender (in an anti-sentimental fashion), witty, surprising and bold. 

Re-reading Blue Studios by Rachel Blau Duplessis.  Arrested, once again, by this:  "I try to write so that if a single shard were rescued in the aftermath of some historical disaster, that one shard would be so touching and lucid as to give the future an idea of who we were......It is, of course, an impossible standard but not the less compelling for that reason."