Winter carnival day here in Harmony, so I cannot waste time on writing but must mix up a week's worth of bread dough and then crawl around in the back of my closet looking for my ice skates.

In the meantime, here's an email I got from my friend David, in response to yesterday's post. Isn't it lovely how the wandering mind works its magic?

Good question is right. Your response that somehow art matters generally is also, for whatever reason, good to hear you say.

And, mind indulging me a moment? This morning I read a Kipling letter excerpt that for no special reason other than it was Kipling made me think of that verse in his "Baa Baa Black Sheep", from an old grandfather:

"And then up came the lovely Rose,
The Philemon her fire ship closed,
And the littler Brisk was sore exposed
That day at Navarino."

I came across it a few years ago in a little anthology, and its rhythm and cadence still give that little vibration inside. (And I love the "littler", somehow so much better than "little".) But more importantly, it's the past tense, the remembering part of it that is a lot of what gives it that special, well, something, I guess. That day at Navarino. Almost a touch of melancholy. And it occurred to me it's the very same in that opening to All The King's Men: "…To get there you follow Highway 10 going northeast out of the city, and it is a good highway and new. Or was new that day we went up it." Or was new that day we went up it. That touch of something past and gone. In this perfectly balanced little couple of sentences. More than wistful, like a profound sadness, but barely present, just in the background. Remarkable.