This week is flying by: suddenly it's Friday, and I'm wondering how I got here. I'll be glad to have a weekend at home, though I expect I'll be working through some of it, as I stupidly agreed to add even more burdens to my load--a judging gig that has to be completed by the end of the month. But so far, so good with the new editing project; so far, so good with my classes. I'm churning forward.

Last night I went out to write, always a good evening. Writing with that community makes me feel brighter, cleaner, like I've been to church, like I've received an ineffable something that will hold me in grace for the coming week. How can that happen via a scatty potluck dinner, some chatter, and a few open-ended writing prompts? I have no idea, but it does.

So today, with that gift in my pocket, I'll get onto my mat, I'll get back to my desk, I'll pound out a few hours of editing work, I'll fidget with a poem draft. In the afternoon Teresa and I will talk about Southey and Cowper, I'll start judging writing samples, I'll mull over upcoming classes, I'll bread parmesan lamb chops for dinner, I'll dig into the McMurtry novel I've started rereading. So many words; so many sentences. Isn' t this a crazy literary life I lead?

Yes, I know: these January days are a quickstep into the spiral of Trump. So what's your resistance? Mine is to swim in every wonderful thing he knows nothing about. I read books! I go for long walks! I hug my cat! I kiss my beloved! Take that you, asshole. Bet you wish you were me.

As most of you know, in 2023, after more than a decade at the helm of the Frost Place teaching programs, I stepped away from that position and made the decision to reimagine my teaching in new places and new ways. Monson Arts, where I had already been working with high school writers, had offered me a home for a different kind of conference, one that was certainly linked to the work I'd been doing at the Frost Place but that was not solely aimed at classroom teachers or strictly bound to the legacy of Robert Frost, one that gave me opportunities to create cross-disciplinary links and rethink how faculty and participants might interact and shine in the lush surroundings of an artists' residency center.

To my joy, amazement, and relief, last year's conference was a total success--both financially and program-wise. The staff at Monson Arts took magnificent care of us, and we had a full slate of participants, some of them Frost Place alums, some completely new to the venture. The enthusiasm and confidence of participants, faculty, and staff was humbling, in the best possible way for me. It reminded me that even my small efforts can cast a few ripples into a bigger pond . . . so I'd better do my work in this world as hard as I can.

Sometimes that means change. Immediately after last year's session, my associate director, Teresa Carson, and I began to talk about how we might revise the conference to create new openings and opportunities for exploration, collaboration, and community. One change is that we will now weave what was an optional add-on Writing Intensive fully into the week's program, with Teresa as the guiding spirit behind those linked activities. Another change is that we are bringing in guest faculty who specialize in arts beyond poetry, who use poems as a springboard and an inspiration for other kinds of creation.

This year our guest faculty will be Gwyneth Jones, currently a dance professor at Bowdoin College, with a long professional career in New York, London, and elsewhere; and Gretchen Berg, a poet who works in physical theater, often with very young children, and has been a member of numerous dance, theater, and mime companies.

Registration is now open for the 2025 Conference on Poetry and Learning at Monson Arts. Please note that there are numerous housing/meal options available to you. If you prefer not to stay on campus, maybe so you can bring along family or dogs, there are lots of nearby cabin options. And if you prefer to handle your own meals, the houses on campus do have full kitchens. Chantal Harris, the executive director at Monson Arts, can help you work all of that out, so contact her directly. If you are interested in applying for a scholarship, please let me know, and I will add your name to my list.

Also, this year we are strictly limiting our numbers to 15 participants, so you might want to apply early to hold that space.

And if you would like to support our scholarship fund, we would be so grateful. All donations will go directly to supporting participants who would otherwise not be able to afford to attend.

This apartment at Monson Arts in is on the luxe side: king-sized beds, and G and I each get our own bathroom. So I read in the tub for a while, then slept well on my giant mattress, with dreams of my grandfather's farm, and soon I'll wander downstairs to the general store for coffee and yogurt.

I haven't seen my students since mid-December, and I hope they'll be able to settle back into their work, I hope I'll  be able to settle back into my work, I hope the work will be able to settle back into us . . . all of its wondering, wandering surprises and concentrations and patterns and upsets and strange discontinuities.

Yesterday was catch-up-between-roadtrips day, which means that today is embark-on-the-next-roadtrip day and also start-a-new-editing-project day and try-to-squeeze-in-a-long-walk-among-the-chores day, but at least it is not wash-dry-fold-five-loads-of-laundry day anymore.

Actually this trip north will be more fun than usual because my friend Gretchen is coming along to hang out with the kids, see what we're up to, mess around with some drafts and revisions with us. So it should be an enjoyable outing, even if I'm not full of enthusiasm about traveling again so soon.

My mind is feeling a bit scattered. I haven't settled myself down to anything beyond housework yet: the glitter of our New York City weekend is still distracting me. But I suppose employment will tame me again. It's been a couple of months since I've had a steady editing gig, a month since I've been in the high school classroom . . . It sure is easy to not hold down a job.

The bus made good time, and we landed in the little northern city by the sea 45 minutes earlier than scheduled--a miracle on the New York route, which is almost always snarled in traffic. Our neighbor sweetly fetched us home, and the cat howled his relief at our return, stomping around in delight as he watched me light a fire and get out the cribbage board and thus prove that we had no intention of leaving him alone again.

And so here we are at Monday again. Shortly T will trudge off to work, and I will battle with laundry and house stuff and groceries as I ready myself for tomorrow's trip north and the restart of my high school year.

It snowed while we were gone--just a couple of inches, but enough to change the quality of light, add a glimmer of pale below the darkness. Home feels restful, even spacious, after a few days in the crowded Brooklyn apartment, and its familiar sounds and smells are comforting. Our visit was so lovely, so cathartic, in so many ways. But I am ready to be home, and sorry that I have to leave again so soon.

Well, such is the working life. At least I have all of today to get myself and my air space in order.

I will read Southey and Cowper, I will work on poem drafts, I will wash floors and wash clothes, I will restock the cupboards, I will go for a walk, I will answer emails, I will make dinner, I will water houseplants, I will smile at Tom, I will think wistfully of our children, I will squeeze the cat, and all of this everyday clutter is being alive, and I am trying to pay attention to that, trying to remember that now is all that I can count on, and so I am counting on it as hard as I can.

Yesterday was a work day--a class on poetic research that, at least for me, was really fun. Meanwhile, T and the kids hung out, all descending on me later in the afternoon before everyone split up for the evening. T had made reservations for the two of us at a Japanese restaurant with a sushi tasting menu, which gave us a chance to take a long walk on either end of our meal. And then we fell asleep pretty quickly, no doubt a side effect of my insomniac night before.

This morning we'll meet the kids for a diner breakfast and then make our way back into Manhattan to catch our bus. It's been a tremendous weekend--so good on so many levels--but it's time to find my way back into my familiar days. I'll head to Monson on Tuesday, then start a new editing project, begin the next round of class planning, try to sort myself into the demands of winter, of work, of my own thoughts.

A quick good-morning, as I'm juggling time. I struggled to fall asleep last night but did manage to steal a few hours around daybreak, and now I need to focus on getting ready for class. I'm not sure why I was so wakeful, but likely Ray's ghost had something to do with it.

We did have a lovely, lovely day yesterday: breakfast and the Cloisters with the kids, then a beautiful dinner out with T's parents, a sentimental visit with the kids to Ray's bar where I drank nothing but water, a hand-in-hand walk home with my dear one. It's been wonderful to be here with our young people, with our parents, with each other. But also I've been so emotional, which accounts, I guess, for the sleeplessness.

Anyway: gears switched. I'm going to work.