mea culpa

I haven’t been much of a blogger recently (as you very well know), and I’m not only sorry, I’m embarrassed. I’ve never let myself go this long without at least one skimpy post. And it’s not that I haven’t thought about blogging; I’ve thought about it every day for the past two weeks.

I thought about it after I attended a wonderful poetry breakfast at a friend’s house a week and a half ago. One of the editors from Graywolf Press was there, and he offered a short poetry tutorial and described what made him say yes to a collection of poems. I nodded and laughed, my brain beginning to sparkle and snap with coffee and words. I wanted to post excerpts of a few poems he read: Tony Hoagland’s “America” and William Stafford’s “Traveling through the Dark.” I wanted to post about how the morning was bright and crisp, and when I left the breakfast, I stopped and bought a book—Jhumpa Lahiri’s new collection of stories—and how I drove home slowly, along the river, holding the rhythm and words of the morning for as long as possible.

I wanted to post about my ninth anniversary, about the lovely dinner D and I shared, the delicious bottle of wine we drank, the molten chocolate cake we devoured. I wanted to post about the first bottle (of milk) that Zoë drank. She finally—at almost 8 months old—took a bottle! Hallelujahs went up all around our house.

Over the last week I kept thinking oh, I’d like to blog about that, but then three days would go by, and it would feel too late. I’m afraid I can’t keep up with anything right now. It’s as if time is evaporating, disappearing faster than I can move, faster than I can think. November should be better though—post election, post my sister’s wedding—and then I’ll be back here regularly. I promise.