The thermometer reads eight degrees this morning, but the weather forecast promises that today will be the last of the deep cold for a while. Ahead we've got days in the forties, maybe even reaching the fifties by next week, and I am eager for the muddy, melting mess that equals early spring in northern New England.

No travel this week, and a fairly loose schedule. I'm waiting for a new editing project, and P and I already have our planning done for next week's Monson scriptwriting class, so mostly I'll be working on teaching conference prep, the upcoming Poetry Kitchen class, and my own poems, along with whatever spring-cleaning projects I set for myself.

Yesterday I got a note from the publisher of Vox Populi telling me that my poem "To the Republic," released yesterday, "is the best poem about our national crisis that’s been written so far. It is a masterpiece of evocation and restraint." This is straight-up flattery and cannot possibly be true. Nonetheless, his kindness has led me to think about metaphor as both cloak and dagger. I think maybe I'll talk about that during my writing-for-the-resistance classes this spring.