A Luminous Halo

"Life is not a series of gig lamps symmetrically arranged; life is a luminous halo, a semi-transparent envelope surrounding us from the beginning of consciousness to the end." --Virginia Woolf

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Location: Springfield, Massachusetts, United States

Smith ’69, Purdue ’75. Anarchist; agnostic. Writer. Steward of the Pascal Emory house, an 1871 Second-Empire Victorian; of Sylvie, a 1974 Mercedes-Benz 450SL; and of Taz, a purebred Cockador who sets the standard for her breed. Happy enough for the present in Massachusetts, but always looking East.

Tuesday, July 18, 2006

Heat

It's been around 100 degrees for the past couple of days, and humid, too. Thundershowers were supposed to come and break the heat, but never did. This is the kind of weather that kills people.

Amir is not coming out of his air-conditioned room, the ferret is snuggled up to a bag of ice cubes--and I'm in the loft, which is if anything hotter than outside, because the computer is here. Taz won't leave my side, even though downstairs is much cooler, and she's supposed to be Amir's dog in the first place. She'd rather lie on her side under the skylights, panting heavily, than relax in her master's cool and cushy pad. Go figure.

Here's a poem by H.D., appropriate for this season:

HEAT

O wind, rend open the heat,
cut apart the heat,
rend it to tatters.

Fruit cannot drop
through this thick air--
fruit cannot fall into heat
that presses up and blunts
the points of pears
and rounds the grapes.

Cut the heat--
plough through it,
turning it on either side
of your path.

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