b quad begins

So. It is misty-grey cold outside, the temperature between chilly and really cold, and I cannot commit to an outfit. Scarf and sweater? Coat and dress? Boots? Tights? What is this? But I am loving the chill, as it finally feels like fall and I think I am more productive and focused when it is cold outside. Plus I like my room more.

So.

I just started a fantastic new class called Writing Chicago (with the same professor I have for Renaissance Literature). We are reading contemporary Chicago authors and doing writing projects and taking a million field trips and half of the classes will be in the city. It is wonderful! Here is a chunk from a poem we read last night, by Terrence Hayes (National Book Award winner, in the city tonight doing a reading which I cannot make).

Not what you see, but what you perceive:

that's poetry. Not the noise, but its rhythm; an arrangement

of derangements; I'll eat you to live: that's poetry.

I wish I glowed like a brown-skinned pregnant woman.

I wish I could weep the way my teacher did as he read us

Molly Bloom's soliloquy of yes. When I kiss my wife,

sometimes I taste her caution. But let's not talk about that.

Maybe Art's only purpose is to preserve the Self.

Sometimes I play a game in which my primitive craft fires

upon an alien ship whose intention is the destruction

of the earth. Other times I fall in love with a word

like somberness. Or moonlight juicing naked branches.

All species have a notion of emptiness, and yet

the flowers don't quit opening. . .

- Excerpt, "Lighthead's Guide To The Galaxy"

Photo: me doing frantic reading on my couch for current events quiz.