Birch Island Books

The leaves are dripping onto each other wetly, but I wonder if they are telling a fib.

The sky is so clear and the stars are so sharp and the air is so crisp that I could embroider on silk with this morning.
Orion, Big Dog, Little Dog right there above me, clear, clear, clear sky limned with dawnlight.

Wait.

First, have I told my dogs about those dogs?? We might need Dog Storytime tonight – it’s Friday!

But second, he has two dogs, Big and Little – I have two dogs, Big and Small. In Orion can I see my reflection? Even in part?

It’s the Dark of the Moon, and Things Happen during the dark of the moon, ye ken well what I mean.

Very well, then. When the Hunter Moon rises fresh, I will learn, study, read, write, follow, discern, listen to the lessons of the Hunter in the sky. My goodness.

Something very, very woofable was out there this morning.

We walked particularly early, particularly briefly, because the mundane world somehow filled up our Thursday.
Ridiculous world.

But, world aside, something very, very woofable needed woofing.
I must admit that I am not terribly convinced of the rightness of that statement, as Big Dog went two ways and Small Dog went two other ways with their sure and certain woofings.

If they didn’t know where it was… then… was it there?

Perhaps it was A General Woofing, Such As Might Demonstrate the Qualifications of the Woofers.

Here nor there, it was too damned early to be woofing and the Samoyeds next door answered, possibly waking my dear neighbor; then the collection of dogs across the street chimed in, possibly waking those dear neighbors.

I am truly sorry that you were wakened.
I think that they woofed for no reason, because that amount of woofing usually means “Deer in the meadow!” and we heard no retreating hoofbeats.

To paraphrase a wonderful writer, “This dog comes equipped with a woof.”

The stars went early to bed this morning.
In no way was I frightened by this – they were not stolen, nor had they abandoned ship, they just all collectively yawned and pulled cloud-blankets up and rolled over and snuggled down.

Who doesn’t like a good early-to-bed on a rainy day when the power has gone out?
And when the ekkeltricity comes back, and the neighbor’s generator is finally silent again, I turn the lights back out and unplug the fridge for a few minutes to re-capture the delight of the silence which is our natural inheritance.

To nap in grey blankets. Not too long, remember the fridge.

It’s a beautiful day, Mama, clouds over all the world.

Stop, she said.
Be present and witness, she said.

I’ll be here and now, then, thanks for the reminder.

Autumn changes, smells and colors, turkeys in the woods,

I just caught myself thinking ahead – to good things, yes, lovely things that should be planned for but not right now.

Right this moment is for right this moment.

We walked the meadow this morning, down and around and up,
Visited staghorn sumac
And there is one maple tree with amazing personality, multiple trunks, sometimes a roost for turkeys and it issues invitations to read novels in its shade.
I passed the time with it…

And the dogs found a spot where the grass was irresistible,
right on the margin where lawnmown path meets meadow growth.

They ate it, they licked it,
And at first I assumed that they were thirsty and wanted this delicious dew.

Then I occurred to me, and I will lay a nickel bet down on this,
I’ll bet that’s where deer stood last night, browsing the meadow,
Leaving their scent like a ghost for flavor-hungry dogs.

There he was, after months away with only one glance across millions of miles in the middle of the night when we each had something else we had to do.

This morning, there he was, right outside my door, strong and bold,

Orion.

There was more than enough moonlight for us to take a walk,
and talk,
and his dogs and mine ran together

Until dawnlight called all the dogs to breakfast.

Morning was a bit too early for me to walk today,
but I know that one day missed is a very hard habit to break,
so we determined to get out later,

and we did.

We carried the mail up, which always brings up memories of designing this mailbox, so round and so green, covered with lichen, and the number not so much painted in white finger nail polish any more, but etched into the metal where the polish underwent some kind of stunning chemical transformation.

It was during a rough patch, when every single housebuilding thing was going wrong, and it felt like everyone was against us when the mail carrier – whom we never met – left a little sketch in the mailbox. A design improvement. A wordless message.

“I see what you’re trying to do, and even though I had to leave the “this does not conform with Post Office specifications” pamphlet, I have been thinking about how to accomplish your goals within the specs.”

Thank you, anonymous stranger, rural postal carrier, for saving our family’s morale with an act of kindness.

Full Harvest Moon, yes!
and a beautiful wind storm coming.

That’s primal; that’s nostrils flared and wind ruffling my mane —

I found a wild grapevine climbing a wild blackberry.

There’s a good story in that.

A beautiful day for me so far,

And most beautiful of all were Sgiobalta’s feet.
(say SKIPple-ta)

Her name means “quick, neat, precise, like a dancer’s feet”
And I watched her tritty-trot about a hundred yards straight toward me
never breaking into a lope, never stopping to sniff or saunter,
just a sweet, quick trot exactly like a dancer.

Have you ever watched a Highland dancer – one of those competitions?
Their torsos and arms so steady while feet fly in precision and power, but unrestrained pigtails can fly?

/*nod*/

When Sgiob trots like that, it makes her ear-tips dance.

We walked in the middle of the night last night and Saturn was leading the moon to the horizon like a lover.
But Saturn was following Jupiter who had run ahead below the line where I am told that they still are planet, they still move steady in their marches,

But what if I didn’t have to believe those words?
What if I could believe the story in my head that they suddenly twirl and dance to the music of the spheres and spinning spun the arms and legs out of the center

— because centrifugal force —

and dancing ribbons and balls and the gods, once they have set, are wild expressions of power

and then, because they are deep expressions of place in the Cosmos, they return from that dance at the moment needed to define Time and keep us on our course.