back,

I was going to say home, but this place is not any way/shape/form a home.  But, at least I have Bogart back with me again.

the s(c)en(t)s(e) of autumn

Did my first baking in the new place to celebrate the change of season~although 90 degrees and raining doesn't quite feel autumnal to me.  

Some people have cast aspersions on my beautiful Trader's pumpkin muffins by calling them cupcakes.  Full of dark orange beta-Carotene goodness.  On my first dorm duty of the year~259 days to go!

and, it's autumn

"Autumn"
by Rainer Maria Rilke

Leaves are falling, falling as if from afar,
as if, far off in the heavens, gardens were wilting.
And as they fall, their gestures say "it's over."

In the night the heavy earth is falling
from out of all the stars into loneliness.

We are all falling. This hand here is falling.
Just look: it is in all of us.

Yet there is one who holds this falling
with infinite tenderness in her hands.

hour at a time

Beautiful shiny headlights~courtesy of the bro-in-law.  We forgot to take 'before' shots, but trust me~after 13 years of thousands of miles of driving around the country?  They were completely clouded over. 

Since I don't attempt to run him over with large toys or step on him, Ari has been quite happy to snuggle with me.  (That I brought all of Bogart's treats up here with me probably also aids this sudden friendship.)

It was only last Sunday that I thought we were having our usual slothful afternoon.  I've never been less ready nor cared less for a school year to begin, but the bell rings early Monday morning to kick off my 15th year of teaching. 

the ghost of loss

A friend sent this blessing by the poet, John O'Donohue.  It came with perfect timing as I just threw away Bogart's Samsonite carrier and the realisation of his goneness is sinking in.

Last Austin pose

Beannacht

On the day when

The weight deadens

On your shoulders

And you stumble,

May the clay dance

To balance you.

And when your eyes

Freeze behind

The grey window

And the ghost of loss

Gets into you,

May a flock of colours,

Indigo, red, green

And azure blue,

Come to awaken in you

A meadow of delight.

When the canvas frays

In the currach of thought

And a stain of ocean

Blackens beneath you,

May there come across the waters

A path of yellow moonlight

To bring you safely home.

May the nourishment of the earth be yours,

May the clarity of light be yours,

May the fluency of the ocean be yours,

May the protection of the ancestors be yours.

And so may a slow

Wind work these words

Of love around you,

An invisible cloak

To mind your life.

detente with cousin Damian

(And I've no idea why Blogger is posting my comments twice.)

love speaks me entire, a word of fur

Snoozing in the Austin sunshine, October 2015

Mine, says the cat, putting out his paw of darkness. 

My lover, my friend, my slave, my toy, says 

the cat making on your chest his gesture of drawing 

milk from his mother’s forgotten breasts. 

You just thought you were going to sleep on your pillow.

Let us walk in the woods, says the cat. 

I’ll teach you to read the tabloid of scents, 

to fade into shadow, wait like a trap, to hunt. 

Now I lay this plump warm mouse on your mat. 

Striking a pose

Lovin' the Texas warmth, 2013

Always chattering

Guarding the balcony garden

You feed me, I try to feed you, we are friends, 

says the cat, although I am more equal than you. 

Can you leap twenty times the height of your body? 

Can you run up and down trees? Jump between roofs? 

Not. Pleased. Tracy, 2012

Let us rub our bodies together and talk of touch. 

My emotions are pure as salt crystals and as hard. 

My lusts glow like my eyes. I sing to you in the mornings 

walking round and round your bed and into your face. 

Snuggly purr ball

Seattle, 2010

Come I will teach you to dance as naturally 

as falling asleep and waking and stretching long, long. 

I speak greed with my paws and fear with my whiskers. 

Envy lashes my tail. Love speaks me entire, a word 

of fur. I will teach you to be still as an egg 

and to slip like the ghost of wind through the grass.

Marge Piercy, “The cat’s song” from Mars & Her Children (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1992). First appeared in Matrix 28 (Spring 1989). Copyright © 1989, 1992 by Marge Piercy and Middlemarsh, Inc

Helping with my thesis, 2009

Seattle sun, 2009

Loving the Christmas gift from the parentals, 2006

City kitty, Alameda 2005 

respite

You really haven't grocery shopped until you've gone race-car-cart style. 

If love and support can be measured by stickers, I am doing very well.

And now that I'm out of the damn dorm, I may light a candle in Bogart's memory.