The Traveler

I knew somehow you'd finally see me.

I've been singing from this open location for thirty-five years knowing that my song was not quite the right combination of notes, not quite the proper cadence to catch your ear.

But I've studied closely.
I've listened each season when you and your musically inclined flock pass through our forest echoing from treetop to highest bough.
Our children would fall asleep late summer evenings counting your spiraled melody and tale. Or, I'd be out very early, in the garden's cold mountain dawn. First one song, then another would peak above the river's spill, telling me of Joy.

When we actually met, I was close enough to hold our presence within, as though breath shared between us. And you didn't fly off, anxiously busy to be away, more as though you would have enjoyed staying longer and said, with a glance, that perhaps we'd find each other again.

Maybe some wet rainy day in the fall when being close would provide needed warmth.

I'll keep singing until then. And watching; listening.

If not Santa Fe...

Barstow...
"when we'll turn
the calendar to the wall
for a few brief days?" Ted McMahon

We'll stay up late listening to the trains,
and when the robins sing
we'll wonder about the midnight sun, My Love.

Then, I'll drive to The Grand Canyon and we'll walk
back into the history of the Earth.

A Change In The Weather

The land's been dry since the melting of all that snow. They say it's been the hottest May and early June in a great many years but I've been gone away watching the old one grow much older so I really can't relate. Now that I'm back, I'm frankly thrilled to find summer means business.

This afternoon I was indoors, hidden from the mosquitoes. They were so thick out there that to stand in one place for a few moments can attract hundreds, ("Let go of the hose and walk away! Ade! Let go of the hose and walk...away!")

I found myself watching the green treetops, fingering the overcast gray. They were tickling the underside of cloud cover. Tiny breezes. Not enough to waft away the buzzing clouds haunting the screens, but enough to make all visuals beyond the windows purely hypnotic.

I splayed my insides open a little further (been locked down such a long time, you know, staying still for the frail and elderly), and when I did, the breeze seemed to gather a little.

"Hell, widen up baby". The breeze snuck right on in through the parted window, across my belly, up into the opening parts of me, over my bare shoulders and down my back.

I thrust my chin upward and listened to the river clawing away at the banks. The score performed is a roiling symphony that when combined with robin song and that pervasive buzz at the screen, well, the sounds can just slide down into your veins. I let 'em have their way.

You know, I could tell without even peeking, that the breezes were picking up steam to perform a tiny miracle; a sudden dampness made every hair tingle.
The silver-dollar flat splats on the red steel roof were the tapping of as many raindrops as there were mosquitoes. The stinging nettled winged ones were backing off a little, shrinking and swirling into their myriad damp enclosures.

As the cold wet gift from heaven let spill its blessing through out the parched forest and across the river flat. A sharp, surprising, inhale reached out from below my navel.

And then the smell.

Oh the smell... a sweetness indescribable.

Sitting On The Dock Of The Bay 6/6 & 7 '09

San Francisco's many and varied neighborhoods are where my younger siblings and I spent sporadic early seasons emerging in the big city when we visited our Poppa, Dick Revenaugh.

I recently arrived there on a Saturday morning via Amtrak at the famed Ferry Building, on lower Market St.

The day started by crossing paths with acquaintance, Aniko from Gather.com. Walking and talking, we quickly touched on cyber relationships, the wild ride of parenthood, and the challenges of marriage amidst transnational citizenship, (Ade as student on that one, just trying to fathom logistics alone).
We parted feeling like friends and I hope we get a chance to see each other again.

I headed back up Market street, destination: The Herbst Theater. Garrison Keillor was giving a reading from his delicious pink volume of 77 Sonnets. The evening was a benefit for the 826 Valencia Scholarship Program.

Hoofing with bags heavy enough for a small burro (who was off grazing elsewhere), I arrived at the famed City Center early enough to change into evening attire and mosey up to Max's Opera Cafe for Silver Dollar potato latkes and the piano bar.
Perfection!
So was the man in the red shoes!
High in the balcony and removed from mid-center by a few seats, I was tucked-in nicely enough to slip out of my black linen heels and drift into an advanced state of delight with the voice and imagery I've come to desire on a daily basis (now, not to gush but...!).

The tall man with the feathery eyebrows, perched casually. Placed in the middle of a faded Persian carpet, the stool, a microphone, and the poet opened an intimate space for everyone there. With Rich Dworsky as his piano accompaniment, they had the place lit. Silvery heads and imaginations glistened all around, as did "the youngers" present. Those holding romantic, poetic rompage in high regard were satisfied by the end. Keillor had again offered us beauty; the chance to love and to laugh.

Afterwords, I kept company with the full moon in all the old neighborhoods, walking and exploring memories throughout the rest of the night. I found nearly every location where we'd visited with R.L.Revenaugh as he nurtured the pulses of cultural change from his salon-type living arrangements.

I also found the building where I'd rented my first shared apartment. It was there I recognized I wasn't ready for the city as naive eighteen year old. I was yearning instead for the wilderness that I'd find a year later in Alaska.

Dawn was welcomed with a few good cups of coffee on Lombard St. at Mel's, the original drive-in burger joint. I took the time for a diner style breakfast and enjoyed the warmth, a place to read and people watch, before starting the day.

The elegant Marina district curves down to shoreline. There I found The Fort Mason Center. This old military post is now home to summertime art programs and year round cultural events. The waterfront location provided a gorgeous nest in the sunshine to watch the goings on, write and snooze.

I was joined mid-day by another Gather friend, Granny Janny and her pal Becky. We spent a lovely time getting to know each other at The Greens Restaurant. We then went walking through the six or seven blocks of the Union St. merchant's festival.


My Roman Holiday was a definite kicker. I'm looking forward to another installment on the return to Mazoo and Bako.

But for now...the sweetness of HOME!

Tonight, For The Robin Hour

A return to the nest via a circuitous route.

I doze and walk the streets of San Francisco looking for a spirit that I recall from years gone by; the long tall lass who found her young womanhood months before she died.

After dozens of city blocks, around 3:30 AM she finally spoke to me from the corner of Sacramento and Pierce. I sat across the street with her for a while, shadowed and cold amongst elaborate concrete landscaping. We were listening to the full moon and early summer wind. The startling Victorian across from us still demanded homage, as much, I'm sure, as it did before our mid 70's earthquake.

I was bundled and bleary, alley cat alone. She was dead and ethereally appealing. We spoke of her sensuality and how with her quickened smile and rapier tongue and wit, she would probably have owned a fair portion of this town by now, had she lived.

She laughed at my sentimentality and how I'd had the old lady verve to deck myself out that night. Penniless and alone, in linen and black heels I'd draped my ideals towards a lover who'd only ever know me by poetic extension. All that heat and tension instead produced an obnoxiously loud car full of sotted young men, being pulled to that moment as if by some unseen force.

I quietly bid her adieu and scurried away from our perch, slipping in and out of the shadows. As I tottered away from that hallowed corner, I hoped their hollering over stolen, captive moments with cameras, tits, cocks and asses would allow me to melt back into the obscure gray, gratefully unnoticed.

The Night Wind kept asking for movement. We spun and whirled through dawn. I held tight to the vision of a white sheeted heaven, laughing, liquid warm lovers, poetically entwined.

While Waiting; A Little Song

Dawn begins where I've laid nights before
thinly pressing roof lines for sky beyond
night door wide open to cool, rug, mat, floor
Fair youth, call gently your memory's fond

Folded street silent, a distant train clangs
chorus of cricket metered divine
note of your presence within me still hangs
light tempered touching silvered dry mind

bone frame extending moist lift from the air
fresh hunger stirs traveling, east at my feet
coiled at base line unwrapped tangled hair
exploring toward sunset my corn-silk blue sheet

Dove stills our yard, buff tailed, alone
collared spot-feathers, your pink-eyes shone

Written Into The Score/ added to and revised Tues. May 19, '09

This morning, a fine radio interview that I'd like to share in some capacity here...

From Radio West 5/19/09:

"You've probably thought about how your e-mail and texting and twittering are dividing your attention - and that it's having a real impact on your life.

Beyond the anecdotal evidence, behavioral science writer Winifred Gallagher says that "focus" may actually be a biological necessity (ade asks:"this is news?"). Attention, she says, is a finite resource and using it wisely is the key to a more productive and healthy life. Gallagher has a new book. It's called Rapt."

From a site called ARTSOPOLIS (reviewer not identified):

"In Rapt, acclaimed behavioral science writer, Winifred Gallagher makes the radical argument that the quality of your life largely depends on what you choose to pay attention to and how you choose to do it. Gallagher grapples with provocative questions, driving us to reconsider what we think we know about attention.

No matter what your quotient of wealth, looks, brains, or fame, increasing your satisfaction means focusing more on what really interests you and less on what doesn’t. In asserting its groundbreaking thesis, (ade again, "groundbreaking? huh!"),
Rapt yields fresh insights into the nature of reality and what it means to be fully alive.

Gallagher’s books include House Thinking, Just the Way You Are (a New York Times Notable Book), Working on God, and The Power of Place. She has written for numerous publications, such as Atlantic Monthly, Rolling Stone, and the New York Times."

The interview was dynamite. Gallagher has a wonderful, science based presentation fused with a practicality and personal story that I found quite engaging. I'd love to have an audio recording of the Radio West interview (a podcast would work for others).

Although I'm caught surprised, as an alien from another planet might be, that we are forever reinventing the wheel towards understanding "mind", it seems we humans are cycling closer and closer towards some sort of center.

Ever developing "Home", the one between our ears.

...riding it out, wave upon wave till the interior buzz and spectral connections gently lend toward mend; flush, mend, back-bend, suspend and again to find a piece of what no one else has touched; the tiny memory of star; and hope.

Then the chorus sang with a part well written for your voice alone. Offered as invitation, to accept or refuse. In that, lay-away home... the "Home" of one's own making.

... a place to sing, or dance, depending...

...or choose to refrain from either.


I'm EVER SO happy to have been from an intensely quiet and focused environment during all of my adulthood. My previously fractured heart and brain have been given room to develop gently, and at my own pace.

To Entertain New Ideas ///

"A Roman Holiday"...


The Song Is You.
The way HOME in June, by way of San Francisco.
The Island Institute 2009

Maori author Patricia Grace, winner of the 2008 Neustadt Laureate Award featured in World Literature Today.
Looking forward to learning more about Grace and Maori culture and the similarities to N.W. Coast cultures of the Pacific.

Three weeks ago, I visited with Nora Marks Dauenhauer in Klukwan, Ak. at the story teller's gathering held during the Culture Week celebration.

When she was speaking to a mixed age audience, it was the little kids up front that she was especially connecting with. This revered elder has a spark and gumption I've enjoyed at many potlatches over the years. She knows how to keep an audience listening.

She's led a remarkable life, focused as an anthropologist of Tlingit culture with her husband, Richard Dauenhauer. The two devoted decades to retaining her people's native oral tradition. Their careers are represented in numerous books and ambitious projects.

Nora, a fine writer and gifted poet, told the kids they could write about anything that interested them. Anything! You could tell they were really listening and thinking just what that would be.

The Mountains Behind Me

It feels at times
as though my crush-less shadow
turns to vapor amidst the sleeping sky
a cool, delicate waxy beauty
scenting the air

I am
jetting away from possibility
the possibility of elaborate skin together
here outside our lifetime
away in the surrounding mist

The Beauty of Saturdays

...and so, right in the pleasure of our star blue and sun-shot yellow bedroom, snow dumping with certain April vengeance beyond the skylight, Hic...cup..cupping streams of cyber transmission prompt me to scuff step slide and twirl on the little fuzzy black rug. I'm jazz dancing to my dearest of Saturday's joy.

I hear stories and laughter and the blackest surprise of wonders from inside that coffin too soon. What? No memories with which to wait out eternity?! Fruitless and forlorn we endure and persevere...ya daddy, ya daddy, ya daddy, Ya!

In two hours, damn, so terribly short, I'm reminded of just what matters most. There's a voice purring far away, one who knows we exist, and in that brief time spent I'm included again.

My dear old pal is nearby on the bed tucked up and snoozing and planning his autumnal retirement trip. Winter was long for him, keeping those home fires burning. A '75 BMW, R90 of superior German make, awaits his command Southward. He'll ride off into the sunset. There, there may be new memories for him to gather.

I'm left thinking of red velvet and Town Hall, zuchinni, rhubarb and smoking wild caught sockeye brought in when the Chilkat drops off from summer's crest. My campfire in the strawberry patch competes with lavender midnight, twilight not quite starlight.

Kottke's playing the Deep River Blues and while our own Klehini hides, impossible now to see past warm dumping whiteness, I wonder about bifurcation and joining The Chattaqua.

Hola! Just as Mayberry resumes around the corner, I watch Raven elegantly perch. A newborn spindle legged black lamb dashs across the whiteness. There's two in every family, sometimes more.

(she hopes to win tonight's snow pool to donate to a larger GK cause)

April Fool's Daughter and Grandson/ RLR remembered on the 2nd

Hey Ma,

A fun post Mom, (< click to article).
I still can't seem to wrap my mind around the fact that not a single one of my acquaintances east of the Rockies has any idea of what the sensation of "breaking in" feels like. Dad's right - you can't know humility until you cross an April snowbank in the absence of snowshoes.

I can't help thinking of that time when I was seven or so, when I took off on an early April adventure going who knows where, and doing it solo, and making it about as far as the place where the garden tank would stand before sinking in as deep as my legs were long and being completely unable to extricate myself. How I struggled and thrashed with escalating levels of contempt and catastrophic rage, never daring to ask anyone in the house to come down and help me lest I expose myself to the even greater torture of embarrassment, and finally giving myself away through the sheer noise of my exertion and despair, at which point you and Dad came down, and to your inestimable credit somehow managed to keep straight faces, and Dad yanked me out by the armpits, but did it a little too abruptly, and I came out wearing only the liner of my snowboot, the shell sunk two feet deep in the snow, and Dad saying - with that vaguely sadistic humor of his that gave rise to such good-natured witticisms as the one about saltwater causing one's feet to fall off - that we'd have to wait until June to get the rest of my boot back.

All in all, a great day to be an Alaskan.

I hope you're well. Happy Birthday. And keep up the good work.

Best,
Micah
April 1, 2009 6:35 PM

Where We Might Overlap

That tunic of cloud hung densely, veiling all planes and vertices.
A saturated blue gray tilted more toward flattening white. No angle of lens could lend such precision to form or catch the magnitude.

Child, don't forget how we tracked near the small, quiet, old, and sparsely swift
with wing, tail and quill.

You and I trail across whispered intent, follow likely syncline and marvel that the animal tracks always lead the best route; least effort spent is energy conserved.

For them, energy is hard earned while we have little more skill than desire.

Still, we take pleasure in practicing flight; river far below our four out stretched wings.

To Be In This Moment

(a little food for thought linked in the title and below)

So, here we are.

From On High

Oh, To Be A Sari Clad Satellite

Would I distinguish the myriad messages coming through?

Would I know who was sending, and like an old time switchboard operator, know how to plug in the appropriate connections?

Would I indulge the temptation to listen in, reaping vicariously the joys, thoughts and despair of both the signals transmitted and received?

Would I, out of devotion to my beloved, always orbit closely or would I spin off regularly to allow chaos to remix the signals?

And would I be self maintaining as I've always been or would on occasion some Earth centered entity send out a little support?

And YES, that I might still catch the drift from my favorite messengers, and, as I have on occasion, be compelled to drop the Sari that I might dance unencumbered in the cool night sky.

(she's left wanting the XM signal...)

Mourning Song

I sit in the old quad of Bakersfield High, out front of Warren Hall. This time it's February 2009 already, and all of the days I spent here as a kid, in a state of elevated darkness, still haunt about in the ashen, dwindling palms.

I turn my graying eyes to the sky and think of you. I wonder how so many miles and tidal surge of lifetimes separate us now. You call to my heart and mind with such consistent kindness and, like all my girlhood boyfriends, I heard you first on the radio.

Back then, in the stifling heat of nights possessed by want and innocence, rocking my pillowed head to the metal collisions; the terrors of purgatory: the Southern Pacific and Santa Fe switching cars; 1:00 AM, 2:00 AM, 3:30, 3:45, on and on till light. The trains and radio were deep comfort to this girl interrupted.

I didn't know I'd be riding those freight trains two years later, following vision North. That they would deliver me from what was murderously mundane, undone, to the cherry orchards of Stockton. Two million Bings and Queen Anns later we'd pick enough for the old Chevy flatbed. Four months after, it was "get thee" to Alaska.

And there I'd find you.

Boys from your parts flocked to my tavern, we of chess and politics and poetry jams. These kids, high on seine crew wealth and good beer, knew of a new comer, their college home boy, red hot radio. I fell, pell mell and stayed.

Sunlight muscles it's pushy way onto the walk, driving me towards the guarded tracks. Beneath the two train crossing, screaming sounds peal from every neuron. Those shades and memory, his dangle dance, open my throat and the morning fills with song.

That older heart duet; there's something more to be sung.

March 17th, 1963

All from the capital city would come by to confer with the Irishman, the dark one who led their imaginations toward a better St. Paddy Day's parade.
I was set atop the bartop, black hair and sallow skin. He gave me the sparkle of Irish mischief in my saddle shoes and eyes. Poppa had handed me a leprechaun's white clay pipe, the stem so thin and elegant I could only imagine someone as clever as he using it.

I have it still. I use it now to help weave a different story. But tonight my eyes keep closing mid sentence, only to jerk awake with moisture threatening to slip down my chin. The fire's so cozy. And the miles spent to get here have me mellowed.
Perhaps tomorrow...

A Duet

Tomorrow night at this time, I'll have made a nest in some quiet corner of the airport in Reno! After five long months of focused intensity, (as my writer father claimed, "I've mastered the art of sitting"). I can't believe I'm heading home.

Today went according to plan. Assisted help came to be with Ma that I might slip away and spend one last scribbling session at 801 Real Rd. The little house seems happier for our visits. The three giant shaggy barked trees out back, one with the nailed on cross ladder, blew brightly and were full of leaves, dancing as wildly as the fledgling birds calling.

I'd snap this little aging wonder up in a heart beat, knowing it's doomed to the bull dozer. The roof is gone. Blue tarp covers the remains of the simple felt and wood shell now holy access for pigeons. But it calls to me, even in my dreams now.

At first I thought I was being reminded of Ma, she too losing her roof. Or of my not so girlish years and terrible diffuculty spelling, though wanting to write while removed from my life.

But then it came to me that it's also a symbol of the other dearest involvement of mine. I think it stands in my heart of hearts for the breaking down of a wonderful forum for discussion that for awhile was holding the fort for many people during this particularly tough season. I'll have to think on that more.

What ever the case, it feels right there.

It's late and my heart is quiet and telling me to tell someone in the world that for today this mother's use of the alphabet is pooped.

Got the garden in today though. And I've planted something for my brother. it will grow to be a particularly poetic salad, if I keep loving this beginning.

The Older Twin

I knew him. I knew him before he knew himself.

And he loved me before anyone knew I could soak it up yet. When I was still more dimple and black kitty trouble propped in the corner of the couch than real.

Tucked safely but alone, he'd show up there, talking a blue string of energy charged sounds, so rich I had no choice but to be enchanted.

That's when I learned how to turn the tables on him. Shave and a hair cut, two bits. If I could make him laugh, he'd stay close, playing with my hands while yelling tall stories into Ma.

Ma still young and challenged with all that we were and everything else.

She whistled. Beautiful sounds, split into two and dancey.

And those two danced. As much for each other as they did for me. They danced together close by, Mama bending over to be the same size he was, both grinning at me cause they knew I'd start laughing. A black mopped, gummy mouthed belly roar.

I was the dark haired spectre who knew them both, especially him. Cause he was always there.

Until he wasn't.

This was written in honor to my old pal Garrison Keillor, who's just lost his brother to a skating accident.
His fine tribute is linked in the title of my poem for all brothers.

the cloister

...under the low hanging steep incline...holding the brightly polished jewels

It's About Form AND Function

In preparing to travel home to my beloved Northlands, and those there who are my beloved, I'm sprucing up the long neglected Blue Room and Hinterlands sites.

My season away, while caring for our Mother has been educational beyond compare. Much has had to do with learning a bit about this amazing cyber medium.
The Internet is remarkable. All those who've known this forever bear with me.
This year due to captivity, I've dispelled with my "fear of technology". Due to the generosity of my sister Mick and her gift of a laptop (Pewter),I've been able to access the world while housebound with Ma.

I'm beginning to shape my pages to reflect those interests. At Gather.com, I've been a daily participant with writers and thinkers of all persuasions. I'll begin to add RSS feeds to some of my favorites.

This week I'm bringing on board The Writer's Almanac, The Poetry Foundation, and American Life In Poetry. On the Hinterlands page I want to have Bob Edwards podcasts and access to his web page and blog.

If you have any thing you'd like to share, I'd also love to feature other's writing. All genres: literary, news, feature stories, journals. My address is on the Hinterlands page, a clickity clack back.

Let me know. I'd be thrilled!