A Two-fer

I.

The future is behind me...

The pulley season is mostly over, the moon is down too soon & the sun peeks up too early to push & pull one another into summer. It's a spring game they play to cut the cold and bring down the pounding rains.

Heading west from town, most often my family still snug in their beds (and if they aren't I stick around there way too long to watch the moon drop or sun leap), I get a view in my rearview mirror of the sun at its most orange, visible & still viewable with the naked eye as it rises up out of trees, or bluff, or in this case Highway 59.

It's funny to me that the sun rises at my back as I drive away. I am no hero riding off into the sunset but some silly pilgrim driving away from the sun & the ones I care about most. 

Today I stopped and took the picture. It isn't well composed (and neither is this description) but it chronicles one of the strange symbolic phenomena of being a commuter who notices things and is just silly enough to try and embed them with significance. It's kind of a curse.  

II.

Let's play three...

I've been sitting here grading final exams. My iPod has been playing background music. Mostly I haven't paid attention to it. However, three songs penetrated the single-minded concentration it takes to conquer the last days of grading. Here they are.

(I'm saving the best for last even though it played first.)

Enjoy:

Oh, it is worth saying that all three of these tunes were first played for me by the same fine person with an ear for great music: the one and only Jeff K.

Thanks, Jeff. Now I am going to drive home too fast listening to "Four Night Rider" over & over & over & over...

Here goes: [Settings: Repeat: One]

A bit of dust...

I don't usually post a poem (or whatever this is) right as I write it, but this time I decided I would. Our youngest son, F., was taking a nap, but E. and I were supposed to watch our nieces and nephews this afternoon, so E. and L. went on over and I stayed here to let F. sleep. I decided to listen to a few records and relax. I chose Hometowns by The Rural Alberta Advantage. The songs on this album are mostly love songs--non-typical love songs--and the album is a continuing narrative. It was a great way to spend an hour of a Saturday afternoon. It made me think about my wife and my family and how being alone, even for a short time, and missing the ones you love can be a helpful experience. The last song on side B of the album is called "In the Summertime". It is a wonderful song. I got up and replayed it several times.  As it ended for the last time, F. woke up and called for me to help him out of bed. The poem came to me at the first pop of dust during track one, but it didn't fully emerge until F.'s cry.
----
Call & Answer

A bit of dust just made the record pop,
a bit of back beat, just behind the bang
& crash.

               Edging the volume
one more notch to hear the clicks
& taps, the sweet impurity of hiss,

careful not to wake the sleeper,
hopeful that the spin stays true--
one more song & back for you.

----
and when we're middle aged,
you tell me i loved you like a renegade
----

The gift of an empty room 

& longed-for sounds:
windows for light, 

drums for heart, 

coupled voices

cut the quiet 

like breeze

through 

heat.

----

our love is strong...

while my heart's still pumping blood.

----

At that last song's last beat, 

the organ's wail or whine dies.

There's one final click & the sound 

of the automatic arm's robotic swing & drop...

The gift of loneliness goes,

no other song will do its service.

But the rising song of a waking son:

Daddy, Daddy, Daddy,...

That call is an answer,

and my answer is  of course.