356: honeybees, and other good things

Tomorrow I turn the big three-oh, which I think is supposed to leave me panicked or flummoxed, or both, but instead, I feel fairly indifferent. To the number, anyway. I'm definitely looking forward to the day. Some good things:

- I'll be eating my birthday dinner at Cafe Brenda, which is a gourmet vegetarian restaurant in the Twin Cities. Fourteen of my close friends and family will be keeping me company.

- A slide show featuring White House Honey. I love that the Obamas now have a kitchen garden and unprocessed honey on their south lawn, and I love the way this slide show is executed--like listening to NPR but with stunning accompanying photographs, making me wish I could keep bees too.

- This weekend, I decided to teach myself to felt. I think I'm already going about it wrong, using too tight a stitch, but I've also decided this: it's about the process. That's what brings me the most pleasure. I haven't yet kept anything I've knit or quilted or crocheted, and I think this is why. Its time with me is in the making.

- Though my new medicine is twisting my stomach into even worse knots, I'm looking at it as a part of the journey, and that's a good thing. I'm on my way to wellness, making good choices, and feeling good about those choices.

- Speaking of choices, I'm joining my dear friend Angie in No Impact Week, which is just a week away. We'll see how I do.

- More signs point toward me returning to my vegetarian roots, just as soon as the meat is used up in the soups and freezer (that my husband won't eat). Read this article in The New Yorker about Jonathan Safran Foer's newest book, Eating Animals.

Have a lovely weekend. And to those I will see tomorrow: I look forward. xo

242

Last night, around quarter to five, Ryan gently rocked me awake, saying, "Aren't you going to the train?" I asked what train, knowing he was asleep, curious as to what he might be dreaming about. "The train with the jury. You're going to be late." No, I told him, that trial was over, and the verdict was guilty, remember? "Oh."

It will be a long while before this trial isn't haunting me too. I've learned that reading the comments on the articles about the trial are upsetting.

I thought I would be relieved to talk about it, happy to be able to share details and opinions of mine, but I've found it dissatisfying--I cannot seem to convey the complexity of what it is to have taken in those six days and then be in charge of reacting. The true emotions aren't present, just a litany of facts.

But even more, it hurts to see people write that he is a "monster" who deserves "the death penalty" and should "become someone's bitch" in prison. To me, these hurtful people both don't understand the situation (coming to a guilty verdict was not easy, and we wanted to qualify it, write little post-its in places where we wish the investigation had gone deeper, the defense had asked different questions, the defendant had gone on the stand and told his version of the night, the victim's regular doctor could be talked to in regards to over-medication, and on) but there were murmurs in the jury room of how some didn't think the defendant believed what he did was wrong. To me, the reaction is probably not immediately Punish him! Punish him! Indeed, one needs to atone for these sorts of offenses, but what about rehabilitation? What about learning from experiences? What about finding a way to become better people?

And most of all: what about creating a better education system, a better after school program that can put things in place? What about preventative measures? That we are so heavily focused on the after, on cleaning things up in this society frightens me. I think of other issues, of environmental measures that are taken long after the disaster point is reached. I think of reading Having Faith and how the solution to pregnant women is to abstain from dangerous foods--local water, fish, and on. Instead of putting the finances and efforts into cleaning up, it's into sending a message that something else will be removed from the diet of a pregnant woman in order to protect the unborn child. It seems so often we're ready to jump into the aftermath.

And don't get me wrong: I think crisis centers and the justice system and all of it have a place. I'm just sad for two reasons: one, that people can be so cruel in their reactions without knowing enough (ah, so easy to judge knowing so very little), and two, that it came to this in the first place.

241

Today marked the end of a long week: three days of jury selection, two days of trial, and one day of deliberation, and I was witness to it all.

The jury selection took as long as it did due to the nature of the case: a black man being accused of raping a white woman. Later, one of the jurors told me something I'd heard before: somewhere in the last decade, some apartments weren't getting rented out, so the landlord took out an ad in Chicago and Gary, Indiana newspapers; the citizens of this town had apparently not had a great many black neighbors, but began to be witness to a rising crime rate--the first murder in many years was gang-related, and just last year at this time a family was shaken up by arrests for crack dealing and making (indeed, the family lived across the street from us). My own life experiences are vastly different; I spent my childhood in Chattanooga, Tennessee, where my birthday parties had just as many black as white friends, and moving to the Midwest was startling in its near homogeneity. Ultimately, I'm not sure what any of that means--I cannot say I'm not aware of race (what does that word mean anyway? I mean really mean...), of culture, but I also feel, with absolute confidence, that when I was participating in deliberations, that neither the victim nor the perpetrator's race was a factor, and I don't believe it was for the other eleven as well. I am all too familiar of how loaded that situation was, and how the deck can be stacked against someone. (Of course, then, is this harmful thinking too? Again, it honestly was not a factor, but I realize this line of thinking can be damaging too.)

Thursday was by far the most difficult day: it began with the victim taking the stand, her affect strange (we learned she had taken a Valium), her thought process slow and her expression often blank, though just as often, she was crying. I was amazed at the burden of both attorneys; I know it's spoken that the burden of proof is put on the prosecuting attorney, but there is a certain responsibility a public defender has that amazes me. Also, that day testifying: the medical team--the ER nurse and doctor--who did the exam and rape kit, which struck me as another form of (necessary) violation, with swabs and prodding, with clothes as evidence, being permanently exchanged for sweats, a secondary part of a rape kit. The ER nurse explained her professional history, which included "traveling"--thirteen week contracts throughout the western United States, including Denver--and for the decade or so she'd been a nurse, she'd only had two rape cases, and both happened to be here in town. The doctor had seen about sixty, he said, and fifty of those were here in town (he also worked in southern Minnesota as well as on a military base, I believe). We ended our day with the interviewing officer's testimony, including the recorded interview between the officer and the victim, and this is where we left it for the day.

Needless to say, I came home and cried. At the time I didn't know if it was true or not, but the experience was vivid and it was clear the victim had gone through something, had experienced something to bring her in that day, that much we knew.

The second day was more official, with more items being entered into evidence--photos of the living room, clothing, phone records, interview transcripts. It's not all black-and-white, these trials. We are fed these cases on television that give us elements that prove "beyond a shadow of doubt" of guilt or innocence. We're given a litany--the injured hand, the busted chiffarobe, the bruised face, the angry father, the frightened daughter (I taught To Kill a Mockingbird four years running while in the K-12 system--can you tell?). Not so here, and that makes sense--a case wouldn't go to trial if there weren't enough evidence to convict, or just as much evidence to decline a plea bargain. There's always a reason to put fourteen people in those chairs, take away their long workdays and replace them with something that will haunt us for a long time.

And Friday, we hoped closing arguments would close holes, but they didn't. We went into the jury deliberation room, that small box of a place with no windows and a narrow conference table, ready to hash it out. We picked apart the facts, drew a timeline on the board, made a map of the apartment complex, discussed relationships and whose children belonged to whom, and on. We asked each other to pretend as if we were the defendant, or the defendant were our son--what then? What could we bring to the table? We discussed what "beyond a reasonable doubt" actually meant, using the handbook we were given that defines such terms. We went through the four elements of arriving at a verdict (did penetration occur, did it occur against the victim's will, was it achieved by force or coercion, did the event occur in our county on the date in question). We talked and talked, telling ourselves we'd stay all day, as long as it needed, because not only did everyone on the other side of that door deserve our complete fairness and attention, but once we run into each other in town, we want to be able to look each other in the eye and say we'd done the right thing, what was best. And when it appeared we were feeling black-and-white as opposed to that gray area (the one with doubts, which plenty were raised going in, and much was answered by our notes, our charts, our examination of evidence), we then began again, discussing of ways in which we might be able to convince ourselves of a not-guilty verdict, playing devil's advocate and questioning.

In the end, we were only gone three and a half hours. And while we were gone, some officers and others in the courtroom that morning attended the funeral of one of their own who had died of a heart attack during a CPR drill at the station--indeed, with the defibrillators and all other materials close by, the next "best" place to have a heart attack being in an actual hospital. When it was done, the verdict read, our things gathered, the judge came back into our little cave, revealed what had been in the newspaper (the perpetrator was an unregistered level three sex offender--what wasn't mentioned in the article was that he was without an address and the offense happened nearly two decades ago--and the perpetrator opted to not take the stand during the proceedings specifically for this reason--he may have wanted to tell his side of the story, but he knew the prosecuting attorney could ask about prior felonies, putting his credibility into question), and the judge let us ask questions--about the process, details left out of the case, and on, which I felt was incredibly kind of him. We were a curious bunch.

And I do wonder things about the outcome: what might have happened if one certain person had been found to testify, or if he would have testified, or if the investigation would have done certain things, or the child she was babysitting had woken up. We are so talented at the what if game and it can bog us down. It comes down to the facts, what was presented in that courtroom, and we can't speculate in any direction, not in such a way that influences our decision; those conversations can be for later.

I'm glad for the experience, the intimate look at the justice system, going behind the scenes, in a sense, though it's been one of those weighty experiences that will shadow me for a great long while.

240: How Today Made Me Feel Better

Indeed, the trial has been emotionally draining. But a good thing: today, Ryan and I took the dogs for a long walk today, enjoying this small bit of blue skies, the sun shining down as we gazed over the Mississippi River and local grainery, knowing the melting is only so far away... I do intend to ruminate on the trial as much as I legally can just as soon as it is over, but we have been called back for this coming Monday. For now, all is quiet, my husband is charmingly distracting (he even danced in front of the newspaper dispensers downtown as we walked by), and I hope whatever is decided is right and just, though after this, I only wish I truly knew what those words meant. Instead, I only know love, right here and right now, no matter how snowy and gritty it might be, and I am grateful because I will always feel safe. Who knew this love would need to feel safe for me to sleep at night.

238: the rural juror

It's late, and this week has already been consumingly long.

As some of you know, Ryan and I have been receiving summons for jury duty off and on throughout the past few months, alternating groans as the name "Yvonne Black" appears on the return label, cursing this woman who officiated our wedding and showed no sign of recognition when I crossed her path in the grocery store years later (big surprise; we met her just half an hour or so before the actual ceremony).

This Monday, when I called in, I expected for it to be canceled, as it always is, as the person charged tends to plea bargain out, and we are left with our half-days half-ruined. Mondays are my non-campus days, so I simply return to the task at hand--be it grading, reading, essay writing.

And since Monday, I sat. And I sat. Great walled rooms, cathedral ceilings, windows looking out at drizzling ice-rain days, my classes eventually canceled, my professors emailed, my anxiety at missing more school (see: Palm Beach; see: AWP; see: snow storm), and there is nothing anyone can do about any of it. All valid, all piling up just before the halfway mark.

Today the jurors were winnowed down from just below forty to fourteen (the two alternates not knowing who they are--a good thing, I think, to keep all of us paying attention). Indeed, I am one of the fourteen, and I can tell you this: it is a criminal case. And that is all.

I did make it to campus tonight, for most of one class and for a Dislocate reading. I'll post some of my favorite pictures from that tomorrow. I was also able to pick up my forty-some student midterms and my forty-some student essays, all of which will be graded over spring break. I know I shouldn't have been, but I was a little shocked when I saw that it couldn't all fit in my mailbox; indeed, they had to bring down a box to stuff it all in. It will be a long week of grading and travel following a long week of heavy subjects and concentration. I will sleep long and hard at some point, though not tonight. Not long, anyway.

202: How I Spent the Inauguration

Some are in the crowded Crest Theatre watching the inauguration projected onto a big screen, but the enormous television here was enough for me: the beloved turkey and brie croissant I'd dreamed about since my last visit here and Sambazon's Organic Acai smoothie, my bed freshly made and poetry dancing through my brain.

I'm back from morning workshop, where Kimiko Hahn did not hesitate to peel apart the poems, giving good advice, little snippets I jotted into my notebook:

- In a list poem, each element needs to be equally extraordinary, or "out it goes"
- Isolate each item in a list poem and check it against the rest
- Where is the poem most honest? Where do we trust it the most?
- In revision, attempt different drafts--not just one new draft--put them in a drawer for a few weeks and see which one works the best.
- If you have trouble with titles, come up with five very different ones. Give it some time, see where those take you.
- Watch out for: overused phrases, phrases that promise too much
- The use of unique, repetitive articles (in this case, "a pleasure" and later, "a confession") to help poem resonate
- Be careful of the melodramatic moment
- If you use repetition in your poem, try altering it to give new meaning
- Splice in phrases (words spoken by characters in poem, etc.) to focus poem
- Some poems need a radiant spark, a surprise to pull items together
- Rule of thumb: know your threshold for repetition (or you could lose your reader, but also know it can be an incantation ("She Had Some Horses" by Joy Harjo)
- Hahn also brought up the poem "Skunk Hour" by Robert Lowell, which is essentially a panorama and has a moment of focus where the speaker states, "My mind is not right" and continues on--and in this, it is an act of telling in order to show.

I write this as Elizabeth Alexander reads her poem. (See a video on preparation for the event.) I think of words, "spiny or smooth," as she puts it, and I'm so glad to be here at this time. I hadn't realized only a few others have read at inaugurations / related events: Robert Frost, who recited a poem from memory when the sun and the wind prevented his first to be seen; James Dickey, that famous jerk with talent; and Maya Angelou, whose snippets of poems grace Hallmark cards as well as Miller Williams, who I had not heard of previously (though I did know of his daughter, Lucinda Williams). Last year, I read Alexander's collection American Sublime, which I really enjoyed, as I began the Vermont College's poetry reading list.

Today is so absolutely filled with hope for me: a re-energizing of my own writing self, a much needed respite from cold weather, and this, oh this, today when hope becomes president.

I'll be back again, after craft talks, a trip to the ocean, and tonight's reading. I'm sure I'll have much more to say.

xo

131

My first presidential election was also my twenty first birthday. Kelly's aunt had just passed away, Ryan was living in Duluth, and Gore versus Bush was playing on the barroom TVs. We sat at Stub and Herb's, my one celebratory drink in front of me and I wallowed in the sorrow of the screen as the nation became more and more red. Indeed, I will admit it, that was the year I voted for Nader.

The next important election brought still more sorrow: Wellstone was killed in a plane crash. I remember the heavy sadness, but also that needed urgency in his memorial, the arena packed, our attention locked in on his surviving family. Norm Coleman won against Wellstone's replacement, former vice-president Mondale.

And Bush won again. To my stupification.

The next birthday election was additionally sad for me: I couldn't celebrate the DFL victories because the school referendum did not pass. Ultimately, it would cost me my job. And true, in the end, this was a blessing, but at the time, the pit in my stomach did not entirely agree.

This election is phenomenal to me: I look on the cover of the New York Times' webpage and I see the numbers:


Obama: 338 (62,748,033)
McCain: 161 (55,595,497)

Senate: 56 DFL; 41 Rep
House: 252 DFL; 173 Rep

Also a happy piece: the Clean Water, Land, and Legacy Amendment question was a YES, adding a small tax, which is a small price to pay when you consider the importance of the natural world and our arts. An amendment after my own heart.

I wish I could sail into this blog post completely thrilled, my happiness that Obama won clear, and I am, I truly am, but I'm selfish and want it all: the race between Norm Coleman and Al Franken may be contested, but Coleman is winning, and I haven't witnessed a recount that swung the other way. The margin appears to be 601 votes out of 2.9 million cast. And I know those numbers above mean Coleman would be handy to tip the balance, which I think, ultimately, is a good thing, as I reluctantly don't want either party to have complete control (feel free to argue me down from this statement), but this is my state, and I want my state to be reliably liberal.

And even more sad: it appears the ban on gay marriage will return to California, after all. This is something I've been furiously spouting on about--I know my friend Emily said it may be supported after twenty years, that it is a social movement, but it's ridiculous to me, and I'm befuddled as to why it's being knocked down and why anyone should wait. I consider it luck that the person I fell in love with and opted for happily-ever-after was a man, but it shouldn't be that way. I should feel the luck in having a person, not that he comes with rights--rights everyone should have.

But I don't want to end it on that note. Obama won! That's a good note to end on, indeed.

116

Linguistics of the MFA program:
- I am going to [eat, usually] the [shit/fuck/hell] out of this [foodstuff, usually].
- [This book, music, whathaveyou] is going to rock [or blow, I think I've heard that too] your face off. [yeeouch]

I am learning to not be that prim high school teacher I once was; sometimes, you can find me swearing, openly, in the classroom, hyped up in expressing how much I loved/hated a particular technique in a story/poem/etc. It's not often, but it might slip, if you watch closely enough.

I've been thinking a lot about how I censored myself as a high school teacher, especially after reading Michelle's very vocal post about gay rights and marriage. That part of me, the one who fell in love with a woman at the end of high school / beginning of college has been secreted away for so long. And I know this blog is completely google-able, that people from high school who might have suspected, or my former students who might now cringe at the thought of their former teacher being very comfortable with saying this, and I think I just have to recognize that it's a part of me that needs to exist, alongside my brazen announcements of deterioration of my body (oh, little breast mouse), and there it is. And I know that I also grapple with the fact of my life being easier since the past nine years have been spent loving a man. And this is just how it happened to be; I could have just as easily fallen in love with another woman once my year plus relationship with Jen came crashing down in a most melodramatic way. (Hey, we were nineteen; this is what happens in that angsty part of your life.) There is a certain privilege that I have been allowed because of the way Ryan and my organs happen to be, and I don't think there is fairness in that. And sometimes I try to avoid the topic altogether because I get so violently upset (and also hugely distanced due to my so-called unique position). Sometimes logic doesn't seem to win out in this country's decision making.

I must tell you other things, things that won't get me all tangled up inside, thinks that spark, but in a lovely way instead of the frustrated way.

- I am now The Carol Connolly Reading Series intern at Intermedia Arts, which means I attempt to juggle a great deal of information and put it into the correct slot. I got the position about two weeks ago, and I don't think I mentioned applying or the interview, but here I am, done with my first week, and it has been going well. It's nice to feel connected to the literary community in this way, and I think it fills a need of mine to be useful to other artists as opposed to selfishly pursuing my own. It's a great opportunity, and I'm really excited to be a part of Intermedia.

- I am now a part of the Line Machine blog. It's put together by Josh Wallaert, whose Webster's Daily blog (finding poetics in the dictionary) I have long admired, and Line Machine is doing something similar to what I had been doing in Collectanea, which I failed to keep up with. Anyway, I believe my first post is going up tomorrow, which is fun. A little Wanderlust. I love the idea of community reading--a choral reading, a sharing of what is on the page, a celebration of the art of language.

- My photo from last summer was put on the Shutter Sisters daily click a while back, and a few weeks ago the collective invited it to be a part of a book they are publishing. It's odd to think of a photograph of mine being in a book, but there you are. Granted, it's a blurb book, but nonetheless, the Shutter Sisters are a talented bunch with a solid following. I'm pretty pleased.

This weekend will be spent quietly: Kleenex, some potpourri boiling on the stove (I had forgotten how good cloves and cinnamon smell!), a good book propped in our laps. Cold season is descending; autumn is in full bloom here. Stout carrots are coming out of the garden and raspberries are awaiting transformation with instructional jam recipes.

105: Minneapolis UnConvention

Yesterday: driving home, spotting someone dressed as the Grim Reaper, the American flag slung across their back, the pole carried as a rifle might be carried. I had forgotten the Republican Convention in town (though tonight, the police cars lined the St Paul exits in more flare than usual, the news on The Current that a significant protest was diffused, as you can see by the photo below).

Photo: David Jules, Star Tribune

Today: reading Walt Whitman by the Washington Avenue Bridge (which, by the way, has been closed to pedestrians on the outskirts, so no photograph of the tree with the shoes just yet, and strangely, a year and a month after the 35W bridge collapsed, and many years after I traversed its outer edges, peering down into the Mississippi below).


Today: The first class meeting of my Intro to Poetry class. Oh, the range! It was so warm in there, despite the goosebumps that rose on my walk in to campus this early afternoon. Oh, and I hate syllabus days; as a student, as an instructor. I just want to write and discuss poetry. As a student. As an instructor. And we did, in the second, sweaty half. And oh, how good it was. I think I glimpsed a very good semester ahead of me. (That, and the poetry workshop and all else that involves being an MFA candidate.)


The highlight of my day: my husband, one of the busiest and most work-addicted people I know, took time from his day to come to the art museum at two in the afternoon, tucked his car into a garage with an hourly rate, just to see me make a fool of myself as students wandered by. I cannot begin to tell you what that kind of support meant to me, how I love him for standing there, arms folded, taking a few photos with his camera phone, linking his arm in mine as we listened to the other readers, smiling and nodding as I later showed him my cubicle in the room that smells like a barn. He is a good man, that husband of mine.

102

Awake at five am, which is entirely strange for me, especially given I was going to bed later than that just a week or so prior. Again, the strange form of ping-pong for my thoughts:

- The sun is not up at five thirty am, no matter if it is winter or late summer.

- My husband can lie about his intentions of getting up early when he doesn't have to just as well as I can. This morning, he wanted to walk the dogs early so he could beat rush hour on the way home. I could have jumped up and down on the bed: he was not getting up.

- I learned from the general TA orientation this morning that it is not a good idea to date your students or get involved in other TAs having a crush on students in your section. It is not, however, illegal. Food for thought.

- You can get a seriously badass parking spot in Dinkytown when you have an eight o'clock orientation on the other side of campus the week before school starts. Fifteenth and seventh, and I tell you, I'll never see the likes of it again.

- I still walked enough to stink at the end of the day.

- I wrote a poem during the general TA orientation. Apparently the Mayo Auditorium is very inspiring. Or maybe it was the slide show hosted by Goldy the Gopher (which was just a little icon--not the mascot in person, which was a huge disappointment given the promise on our schedule sheet--they need to learn to model clarity on their agendas).

- The poem began and ended with the word "mornings." I think I was a little obsessed with the rising sun.

- I also viewed the brilliance of the setting sun on the way home today. After orientation, there was a "best practices" session with the Ph.Ds, MAs, and MFAs. We learned how to plunk our keys down with authority and to show up just as class is starting, unless we are suave with small talk (a talent I am sorely lacking). After best practices, we broke into groups according to what we will teach and we peer edited our syllabi. I think I was a wee bit tired when I wrote mine, as I told my students to contact their email address (as if they were from outer space?). Keep in mind, my friends, each of these sessions claimed many hours, and there was a lot of thinking, mostly sprinkled with a deep set sense of panic and nerves. And after, there was a relaxing dinner with girl friends at Emily's place: homemade guacamole, fajitas, and farmer's market flowers to adorn the table. And I was even greeted by two rambunctious dogs, and even though I think I have a Jersey-face print on my face still, it was exactly what I needed. I was sadly missing my own pups and their forceful love. Oh, so the point is this: it was a long day, and I drove to the tune of the sun rising and setting.

- I also drove to the tune of the Democratic Convention being covered on MPR. And how cool is it that Barack Obama is giving his nomination acceptance speech on the 45th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech? (I taught that to my freshmen each year, and I really loved doing it.)

- I can sleep in just a wee bit tonight, so I am going to curl up on the sofa with a pint and a book, and I don't care if I could fall asleep standing up (which isn't entirely true as I have this blister since Saturday that now covers an alarming amount of topography on my right foot and is causing a fairly goofy hobble) because I am going to read--not edit a syllabus or grade fake student papers or come up with a good and clever response to the question, "What is poetry?" No, no, friends, I am going to read, and it isn't going to be something I'm assigned (or I assign, although I won't be assigning much as the course I am teaching has a pre-established course reader) (and I am going to love 98% of that which I am assigned / assigning anyway, so I'm not sure what the point is here, except there is a bit of a fizz when you are forced to read something, though seriously, who is forcing me to be in school?).

Oh my with the rambling. I better hop on that couch before I pass out just here.

Happy Thursday, all. Next week this time, I will be recovering from the first class I'll have ever taught at the college level. Just fifteen or twenty minutes recovering, in fact. Eep!