Aaltoe’s Blog

More than a year

of not being with friends

or meeting new ones.

More than a year

of not wandering streets

engaging strangers

for whatever reasons.

More than a year

of not attending concerts

theaters, or any public events,

of perfecting vicarious experience:

a futile exercise.

More than a year

of Trump’s outrageous behavior

inciting extremist groups and individuals

and their antisocial acts

challenging societal norms

threatening the structures

of democratic society.

More than a year

during which

Lynn died.

I find myself

reimagining her personage

marveling at her character.

How fortunate have I been

to have shared her life.

More than a year

during which my family

has rallied to my support

to sooth my melancholy

to help find strength

through their accomplishments,

joy through their being.

Perfectly clear, calm,
Sharp shadows
Serenity of the chimes nearby
The quiet roar of reduced traffic
Each day marking a beautiful extreme
For days ahead.

Older people presumably with their shots
Enjoying each other in restaurants
Others crowding sidewalk cafes
All masking larger changes ahead
Unclear in their outline
Let alone their detail.

The world still under attack
From wily viruses
That take new forms
And flaws in the systems of distributing the vaccines.
Is it ignorance, arrogance, opportunism, selfishness
Or “political” behavior of the worst sort
That militates against achieving high levels
Of herd immunity?

So hard to balance
The brightening prospects
Against the ingenuity of the virus
And the prevalent reticence.
Is it surging hope against
Stolid stupidity
Leading to giddy irresponsibility,
The whole community
Dissolving into a caldron of
Hideous self-defeating laughter and squabbles?

Nearly spring
Nearly shrouded by trees
Roofs speak
Their age
Their excellence in design
The lives and preferences
Of the people who live there,
But also their similarity
In what they must do:

Protect, enclose, accommodate.
They express their individuality
In how they address
What surrounds them – other houses, streets,
Backs and fronts.

And the roofs reveal,
The profile and contour
Of interesting interior volumes
And lives,
Sloped roofs crafted of slate, now metal,
Displaying wealth with conspicuous modesty.

The roofscape elements,
Their similarities of sizes and proportions
Of openings, of gable ends, of roof pitches
Create a neighborhood identity
Perhaps stronger
Than than those of the individual houses.

Now to the stern and sturdy chimneys.
Carefuly contrived,
Deliberately shaped
They are a set of personalities
Of their own,
Profiled against the sky,
With their own lives,
Speaking to one another in ways
Only chimneys can.

A fleeting view of self,
beyond grief
negotiating life loss and truth
finding it and saying it
evolving into liberating spaces.

A murder of crows,
more than those mischievous birds,
a canvas for conversations
the arbitrariness of organization
of permanence, of memory
of expectations, of routines violated.

A quest for new skills
to adapt to new circumstances,
to find meaning,
in the midst of surprise, astonishment, fear.

Making sense of the search
for new self definition,
for new ways of viewing
for new ways of declaring
one’s world.