Today Poem

In which I feel quiet and peaceful.

Today is a flock of ravens rising up out of the yard thirty feet in front of me.

Probably they have been foraging under the feeders for the seeds the jays and chickadees didn’t eat.

Do ravens do that?

And what is that sound their wings make?

Today is smoke rising out of the cabin chimney, and the smell of it, and the gray of it against the gray sky.

Today is a can of Campbell’s Chunky soup (Beef with Country Vegetables) and a glad feeling about it.

Today is walking a small circle on the lake, going slow, absorbing the slate-y blue-gray of the low sky. It is our abandoned-for-now fishing hole, the pine-y far horizon, and the sound of snowmobile engines whining in the distance.

The snowmobiles are large quick wasps.

They are signs of life on a remote-island-feeling day.

They sound like adventures.

Today is a message from a younger friend saying she loves us and thinks of us three (me, Rick, and the dog) every day. She says she gets excited every time this newsletter lands in her inbox. That news is what’s made me write this.

Today is the smell of primer fumes and covering a stretch of mismatched wallpaper on a cabin wall. It is being relieved to do it but wistful too.

What are the stories in that wallpaper?

What history lies in each piece?

And what day or mood prompted the montage of them? I want to know.

Today is resting on the couch with my eyes closed, considering how I have missed seeing the northern lights every time they’ve been spectacular in the last who-knows- how-many years.

It is a glum feeling about that.

And then it is a feeling of wonder. Why—I live here! I live beneath these northern-lights skies. Maybe my luck will change, and maybe I will get better at staying up late at night. Either could happen. Anything could.

Today is finding a journal I wrote in tenth grade. I said I didn’t follow the news of the world much and didn’t want to. I said doing that only made you feel bad and helpless, and the best thing you could do was try to act as right as you could in the life you were in.

I do not remember being so much like myself back then.

Today is quiet. I don’t have much to say. I like today.