michigan

A bug by any other name

Dan’s Bugs by Jim Harrison I felt a little bad about the nasty earwig that drowned in my nighttime glass of water, lying prone at the bottom like a shipwrecked mariner. There was guilt about the moth who died when she showered with me, possibly a female. They communicate through wing vibrations. I was careful […]

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Lost and Lonely

I set out on my cross country skis with a snippet of a Wordsworth poem. (The poem is actually set in spring—see full version below—but the opening lines seemed to belong to the wide and empty expanse of a golf course off-season.) I got my close-in shot: But when I backed off for the long shot, […]

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Do not go gentle, go dervish

  Equinox   by Elizabeth Alexander   Now is the time of year when bees are wild and eccentric. They fly fast and in cramped loop-de-loops, dive-bomb clusters of conversants in the bright, late-September out-of-doors. I have found their dried husks in my clothes.   They are dervishes because they are dying, one last sting, […]

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Soon and very soon

March 1912                               –Postcard, en route westward by Natasha Trethewey   At last we are near breaking the season, shedding our coats, the gray husk   of winter.  Each tree trembles with new leaves, tiny blossoms, the flashy   dress of […]

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Bloody bowls

  Kitchen Song   by Laura Kasischke    The white bowls in the orderly cupboards filled with nothing.   The sound of applause in running water. All those who’ve drowned in oceans, all who’ve drowned in pools, in ponds, the small family together in the car hit head on. The pantry   full of lilies, […]

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Jolly melancholy

In spite of the name on the window, this cafe makes me sad.     Laptop and thesaurus in hand, I had stopped by Jolly’s in northern Michigan the other day and found the door locked, the tables gone, and a sign on the door saying thanks for three great years.   Jolly’s Cafe is […]

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