The works & days: time to let go

The plan was to write about the crisis. Instead, I went into the garden. A poem about chopping wood, burning the past, and the grounding rhythm of nature.

Camille Pissarro — Holzfäller (1878)

So the plan had been
to sit at the screen
typing away at it
writing about crisis
in history & today.

Instead went to
the garden with
the kids —

Did some trimming
weeding, tidying up,
sawed some old furniture
with the chop saw —
its brutal whine slicing
through the birdsong —
into neat pieces of firewood
had been lying around for weeks
waiting for the sun to turn up
for the mood to strike amidst
the woodpecker’s tapping
& the background chorus of
Robin, Blackbird, Chaffinch.

The kids wanted a fire
so we started one
burned an old children’s bench
that had fallen apart when
I tried to sit on it, had tried to fix it
but never got it quite right
now time to let go —

Burned some birch as well
some Fountain Grass, their
plumes blazing up real quick
as well as dried hydrangea heads
just a few seconds then gone
time to let go —

I was chopping wood, mainly birch,
but spruce too, to split into thin kindling
and beech—wood the farmer had brought us,
harvested from his own property
less than a kilometer away—rural, nearby, local
Some logs were already decaying,
riddled with fungus; they burned just as well
time to let go —

The kids went along
got themselves some
healthy snacks: 100% chocolate
& nuts: pecan, almonds, some dates as well
and drank the Vulcania water
climbed into the tree, playing
monkeys, harvested some dried
flowers from the fallow beds,
where two huge Brussels sprout
plants waited — most likely in vain —
to be harvested.
time to let go —

We burned thyme, rosemary,
and sage, to ward off
evil spirits, or to invite the
good ones— who can say for sure?

The children found their
St. Martin’s lanterns, while I
prepared campfire potatoes
in the kitchen with
ground beef, butter, and salt.

They were singing when
I got out again and put
the potatoes into the
glowing embers after
taming the flames.

Durch die Straßen auf und nieder…

Now the work is done
sun setting fire burning
drinking coffee eating macadamia

What a day!
And to be alive
so alive in it.

Thinking of the living
and the dead &
how we go on.

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