1. I tumbled out the door this morning, leapt into the Sube, and blasted over the hill to see Jeff Steve at the house he grew up in overlooking Cougar Bay on Coeur d'Alene Lake. Jeff''s daughter is getting married on the beach this coming weekend. I got to have breakfast with Jeff and his sister, Martha, this morning before Jeff drove to Spokane to pick up his daughter and her fiancé.
While Jeff prepared a delicious breakfast of homebred potatoes, eggs, English muffins, and Peet's coffee, the three of us yakked non-stop. As best I remember, I'd never talked with Martha before and learned, for the first time, that she, too, graduated from high school, from CdA High, in 1972 and, like me, enrolled at North Idaho College in the fall of 1972. We never met, but our paths must have crossed back then and I'm even more sure of it as we talked about places we each hung out things we did around town.
Jeff and I talked about the many people Jeff and I both know from Coeur d'Alene, Whitworth, and Eugene. The three of us discussed recent events in Coeur d'Alene, days past and present at Art on the Green (which Jeff and Martha's mother helped found), spirituality -- especially how our spiritual lives have changed over the past 40+ years, and so much more.
Jeff is an accomplished woodworker and builds kayaks, canoes, and paddle boards. He transported from Ventura a canoe he recently built and the three of us ended our visit by going out and looking at Jeff's gorgeous handiwork. Jeff's plan is to take the canoe on its maiden voyage on the waters of Lake Coeur d'Alene, the waters he so deeply loves, that so fully nourish his soul.
I left after a couple of hours or so feeling stimulated, grateful, and nourished by the superb conversations Jeff, Martha, and I enjoyed. I know more about Jeff and Martha's family, about Martha's life, and about how Jeff and Martha both are thinking about spiritual, political, social, and other matters.
I was very happy that we could all find time to break bread and yak together before things start getting very busy with family arriving and preparations for the wedding moving into overdrive.
2. I buzzed up to Costco after leaving Jeff's. I fueled the Sube. I replenished our butter supply as well as our paper towels. We were out of salmon burgers and cartons of chicken stock. Until today, I'd never seen ground coffee available by the bag, but found a two pound bag of Peet's French Roast. I also paid the membership counter a visit and the woman I talked with was very helpful answering a few questions I had about membership details and a rebate check that should be coming one of these days.
3. I thought about hanging out for a while longer in Coeur d'Alene, possibly grabbing a beer somewhere, but decided to return home. Gibbs wakes me up between 4:30 and 5:00 these days and I wanted to return home and catch a few early afternoon Zs.
At 7:00, I tuned into Bill Davie's Poetry Break broadcast.
Listeners to this broadcast email Bill superb ideas for poets to read and some people send them their own work. Bill read poems from "the mailbag" before reading poems in progress of his own he wrote over the past week. He ended his presentation with two great poets: David Ignatow, who died in 1997 after a long and productive writing life and Campbell McGrath, a contemporary poet, a member of the Walt Whitman family tree.
Bill read poems by a contemporary poet in Ukraine. Her name is Yuliya Musakovska.
When I listen to Bill read, I enjoy having other poems spring spontaneously to mind. As I listened to Bill read from Yuliya Musakovska's recent work, a 20th century poem paid me a visit.
It's by Israeli poet Yehuda Amachi (1924-2000)
Here it is:
The Diameter of the Bomb
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