At home. Now, I straighten up, consolidate. And I’ll be done by 3. That’s all the time I’m allowing. The rain, hard, angry, in attack. No run for the writer.
No ‘RV Bistro’. Rather, had a turkey-avocado for takeout, from the new Boudin, down the street.
Trying to upload a student recommendation letter. These letters, the site to which I’m supposed to upload the letter.. complete pain. Need some coffee, frankly. And I think I want to do some offsite scribbling. Feeling encased in this room. Maybe I should go check out the Peet’s on Mission. I do have a gift certificate… OR, I can check out the café next to Boudin. I looked in through the window, briefly, while walking towards where I’d get my sandwich (which was amazing by the way.. the dijon, sour dough focaccia… a delight). You know what.. that’s precisely what I’ll do, what I’m headed to do right now. This rec letter nonsense will NOT ruin my day, I’m deciding.
This book of mine, this semester, I reasoned, or rather calculated: I should be, always, two to three chapters ahead of mySelf. I’ll get to this new writing spot, or potential spot, by 3. I will then come home by 4:20PM.
3:34. Decided on Starbucks, on my block. Sent an email to the online application server, for my students. A rather nasty note, if you must know. These letters are certainly the last ones I’ll write for some time, at least till I’m a FT instructor.
The Rain, even harder. And I capitalize it for good reasons, it very much deserves prominence on this page. I hear the cars speed by on Yulupa. Or maybe they’re not speeding by. Maybe it’s simply the water thrown by their tires that makes them sound faster than they actually are.
Retreating into my own head. That’s all I can do, stationed inside, forced to stay in. I do want to run, but I can’t in this. If it were light rain, I’d be very much motivated. But this pace, energy behind the atmosphere’s message, in these not so little and not at all slow drops, halts me. And I’m taking advantage. You know.. I should have a beer after this bloody coffee. Why DID I get coffee? Should have thought of this before driving all the way to Mission, to Peet’s (which I found is inside Union Hotel, and they can’t take Peet’s gift cards.. how silly, and angering).
This is just the time I need to be writing verse, odd rimes; responding to the uncommon sounds– rain in gutter on wall’s other side, the slapping of little droplets against parking slots. But I’ll stop there. Don’t want the prose monster to gobble my pictures.
The page I copied this morning, from Plath’s entries, on my mind. Which is probably–well, no, definitely is–why I’m watching “Sylvia” right now. In this simplification with which I’m obsessed, I see poetry. I see it giving me everything. And today, this rain, this lovely jail, only helps the writer.
(2/26/14)