Why my son: He is really not a part of this blog, but I will be seeing him soon, so he is much on my mind.

About summer sun: She is shining in Sequim and all over the Pacific NW, and it’s hilarious that after barely a month, people who have lived here much longer than I have are complaining about the heat, when it’s 80 degrees and the rest of the country is sweltering and burning. I am bathing in light and warmth and a little sad because the days are already getting shorter.

What I mourn: All the same things. And a few new ones, it seems, every week.

My news: I’m getting a new kitty, named Bosie (after Oscar Wilde’s lover- who was kind of a jerk).  I’m fond of the name so probably won’t change it, despite my already-cat named Bo. I’ve considered variations: Boise, Boychick, Oh-boy.  Making strategic plans to avoid cat fights.

What I’m reading: an advance review copy of  “The Final Voicemails” (Max Ritvo) and “Birds of the Pacific Northwest”.

What I’m writing: I’m working on a new poetry manuscript titled “why I hate to cry”. I’m also dusting off a novel and made a commitment to attend a workshop next spring to work on it.

What I’m submitting: Poems to impossible journals- so I can reach 100 rejections before the end of the year.

A poem this blog reminds me of even though it is summer:

Mean distance from the sun, mid-winter, Northern hemisphere

I lie fallow in my seventh decade:
91 million miles
from an imploding fireball
beheld as light
that raced eight minutes
to reach my eyes
and has mercifully allowed me
the miracle
of another breakfast.

(Two shiny eggs
smothered in salsa
atop a tortilla; pined for
in preparation; fleeting
as an orgasm.)

I sit at a table
three thousand miles from the Florida coast:
a knife, a fork
grasped firmly in two hands
and cut myself
into pieces small enough
for a child to swallow.

Nothing is simple.
Not our distance from the sun
nor my distance from my son.

from "Mean Distance From the Sun" (Aldrich Press, 2013)