Oh, my word: these Ukrainians. I wake up to find Kyiv still standing strong, and now this, from a Facebook post by the Ukrainian-American poet Ilya Kaminsky:

Me, writing to a friend in Ukraine: how can I help, please let me know I really want to help

He writes back: Putins come and go. If you want to help, send us some poems and essays. We are putting together a literary magazine.

And, that is in the middle of war. Imagine.

Though I've had a hard time thinking about anything other than Ukraine, I did manage to clean the house yesterday, and to go for a walk with Tom, all the while picturing what-if in my neighborhood and my city. What if my neighbors and I were gathering together outside on the sidewalk making Molotov cocktails? What if my older son were stealing tanks with tractors? What if my younger son were singing folk songs in a bunker? What if my husband were moving a mine from under a bridge? It is all too easy to picture. I can see what we'd be wearing; I can hear the laughter and the fear. What has been amazing are the high spirits: the comedy of switching street signs so that they all read Fuck You; the cigarette in the lip; the obstinate hilarity of encounters, even just before oblivion.

We stand on the border

and hold out our arms

for our brothers for you

we tie a great rope of air

--from Zbigniew Herbert, "To the Hungarians," 1957