The day is bright and cold and windy and I am shivering and thinking of warmer places. How difficult it is to live in Maine when the cold north wind is howling down the river and blowing the tops of the waves in the cove outside my window. I’m burning trash wood from the deck I dismantled a few months ago and the oil tank outside my window is proudly providing its last drops of kerosene to the Monitor heater. The forecast for snow has stifled plans for an escape. What to do, what to do? I wrote a poem; dashed it off to be exact. I like the image and I have a photo to help illustrate the beauty and danger of icy winds, shivering trees and the movement of the ocean.
I got paid electronically last night. My social security check hit the bank yesterday but the funds were not available until past midnight. *Bastards.
I’m heading off this morning to Farmingdale to visit my tax attorney. Hopefully we’ll accomplish good things. I will try to pick up a bright, sunny bouquet of flowers for the receptionist, Chris. She is so nice. I like her. The last time I took her some sunflowers and she was very appreciative. It brightened her day I know.
Here is the poem in all its rushed preparedness. I hope you like. May your day be warmer and less bone chilling than mine. Peace out.
TO BE EXPECTED
Pushing and shoving,
The one boisterous the other determined,
What began as an encounter has grown
Into a violent contest.
The ocean has decided to leave,
The wind objects and takes offense,
The one determined to go home,
The other howls and turns disruptive.
Look at the trees trying to
Not notice,
The ledges remain quiet but
Unwittingly contribute.
Help is not on the way,
We all are just witnessing
Bad behavior,
Bullied into silence.
What looks like a concession,
The ocean offers up the tops of wavelets
But slides beneath to flow steadily
Toward another continent.
Rumpled and disheveled
The ocean pushes past,
The wind struggles but
can’t forestall the exit.
The wind cannot prevent its
competition from leaving and
The trees fret and the ledges defer,
Both know the outcome.
It’s happened before,
It’s happening now,
It will happen over
And over and over.
G. M. Goodwin
20 January 2016
Playing Fair and Being Kind 