Late Mother's Day Posting

from PostSecret.com

e. e. cummings:

You have played,
(I think)
And broke the toys you were fondest of,
And are a little tired now;
Tired of things that break, and—
Just tired.So am I.

Take These Tattered Boxes

Tomorrow night is the qualifiers slam for the Arkansas national slam team, and I'm heading to Fayetteville to watch, meet people, and hopefully get to read during the open-mic. I'm taking one of my last remaining sick days, and hope I can hold out the last 2.5 weeks of school till summer comes. The thing I am most excited about for summer: being able to read a book in its entirety! Currently diving into American Jesus, and if my tenth grade history teacher at Mt. St. Mary's didn't convince me to fall in love with Thomas Jefferson already, this might push me over the edge. And it seems my concern that "denouncing" my faith in the miracles of Christianity has not actually caused my interest in religious studies to waver, which I consider a relief.

Tonight was our final Creative Writing Club meeting of the year, so Lennon brought in pizza for the kids, and my now graduated student, Whitney, made special cupcakes iced with her signature symbol. I told her she absolutley could not bring cupcakes iced like this to school, so she cleverly brought the icing with her and frosted the cupcakes in my room while I was in the computer lab with my 7th period. Blue icing, of course. Luckily, all evidence of her indiscretions have been consumed.

Whitney's signature cupcakes.

After our meeting, Whitney let me know that she had gone to receive a tattoo she had been wanting, but I wasn't sure she would actually go through with it. This is a picture she posted of her new body art:

Whitney's new ink

I'd have to say that I disagree with her sentiments. I could quote Gandhi and say, "Where there is love, there is life," but I prefer to let The Format do my talking for me in this scenario. So Whitney, here is my rebuttal.

Spring Fever

Something about May and Arkansas turning wet, lush, and green makes me want to read Henry Miller's novels or Anais Nin's journals. Charlotte gave me both Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn for my birthday several years ago, and I bought every book Anais Nin ever wrote, from her study of D.H. Lawrence to her last diary, in a used book store on Martha's Vineyard the summer after my freshman year in DC. I had to ship every one back to Arkansas in tightly packed, heavy boxes. Thank goodness for book post. I also have the diaries of Rilke I've been meaning to read, and while on Martha's Vineyard I poured over the drawings in the journal of Frida Kahlo, which wasn't mine and I've always wanted to order ever since I left and wrote "Alas Rotas" over all of the pages of my own diary from those months. I should just declare this the summer of journals and devote myself to devouring all of them.

Speaking of summer... it' can't possibly come fast enough.