I was pretty tired yesterday, and mostly I gave into that. I read Jane Eyre, and I listened to baseball, and I puttered mildly among my tasks, and I went for a walk with my neighbor, but I also took a nap at 11:30 a.m. and got into bed at 8 p.m. without shame. This morning I'm feeling more like myself--not that I was sick before, just wrung out.

At first light, the air is still. In the garden my white cat glows phosphorescently among the dark leaves. Upstairs T is deeply asleep. And now, swirling up from the cove, a sudden clamor of seagulls, and the quiet shivers and cracks.

I should read Donne today. I should plant fall greens. I should freeze kale. I should mow and trim. I'll do some of these things, but I don't know which ones. Yesterday I cut zinnias and sunflowers, lined the mantle with blossoms. For some reason, that unnecessary task seemed of vital importance. This morning it still feels that way. Thank god my eyes have flowers--crisp, new, bright.

The small luxuries of the body, each sense drinking in its particular pleasure--air-dried sheets, baking bread, fresh flowers, lemony ice cream, a red cardinal singing in a maple tree . . . oh, this is why I am a homebody, a hausfrau: I am seduced by the small domesticities of earth.

It's been a sad week, a hard week, a week of helplessness and exasperation and elegy and insult. Also, a week of decision making, of moving forward, of doing the best with what I have to work with. Also, a week of shrugging shoulders, of letting things slide, of giving in to the inevitable. Also, a week of talk, of tears, of propping up and propping up and propping up.

But there are four vases of flowers on my mantle. A sparrow is chip-chipping in the lilacs. Gulls swoop and flaunt and quarrel. A beloved man sleeps in my bed.

Our couch is green;

            the beams of our house are cedar,

            our rafters are pine.

 

                                    --The Song of Solomon, 1:17