Granite ledge edges
Tree-tufted valley below
Yellow sodden green.
Razor Life: Seven Years Later
Seven years ago today Eric died, on a glorious, sun-drenched day. Â The forsythia was blazing, warm air drifted through the open windows and the maple buds were dropping their red skin to let the green leaves out.
Six years ago I wrote this poem, on another day of spring sunshine, the forsythia bushes in the neighborhood bringing me full circle to the season of loss.  Finally, I was understanding Eric was really gone, and that holding on to life, while honoring his loss, might just be possible.  “Razor Life” is the penultimate poem in The Truth About Death.  It’s not an easy poem, it’s not an easy book, but it’s the truth as I lived it.  A sister poet recently reviewed the book on Amazon and Goodreads and said “grief is palpable, yes, but so is the skill of the poet . . . this is not a romantic look at death, but rather a blunt and powerfully raw assessment.”
That assessment now includes knowing the rawness of grief does ease, the razor edge softens, and days march on and on whether we can keep up with their beauty or not. Â A few days ago I came upstairs to find a swallow flapping in front of the big windows in my study, the room where Eric died. Â It had flown in the small opening of our shaded bedroom window and moved towards the light. Â David helped it fly out without any harm.
I still watch swallows  against the sky and the cows are already out in the pasture across the road.  Everything changes; so many essentials stay the same.
Razor Life
The pastures are green again, right on cue,
the cows will be out in days. I steal lost time
to meet you, where the train runs into the river,
it’s dark and we move fast, forsythia flashes
gold in our yard, the neighbors’ yard, the bush
in the cemetery on the hill, the catbird who sang
above the blooming lilac in the weeks of desperation
on the porch after you died, you died, you did,
swallows high in the blue, their bellies white
as they turn. I am back to watching the sky,
we still have a car for everyone, we drive a lot,
I talk all the time, the machine is working,
it’s everything will be okay and ah fuck
at the same time, all the time, my razor life.
A Tedious Habit of Introspection
Albany is a city of contrasts. Â Historic brick row houses line streets leading downtown, where the castle-like State Capitol building points its red-roofed turrets into the sky next to the stark, flat geometric shapes of the enormous Empire State Plaza. Â “Albany is full of concrete,” Sam said to me when I told him David and I were headed there for his 40th medical school reunion. Â Actually, it’s marble, not concrete, but the Empire State Plaza is a huge expanse of gray space, rimmed by tall gray buildings, and I could easily see why someone would remember Albany as a city full of concrete. Â There’s even a giant gray Egg, a performing arts center that sits on the plaza like a space ship.
The highlight of the weekend was spending time with Harry, David’s good friend, and driving west out of Albany to a small town to find the farmhouse David rented for three of the years he was in medical school. Â On the way there, David was talking about some recent issues that had been bothering him, and Harry said, “Your problem is your tedious habit of introspection.”
David and I laughed and nodded in agreement immediately. Â Harry meant tedious to David, and in laughing and nodding in agreement, I was acknowledging how tedious my own habit of introspection is to me. Â “You intellectuals think and talk too much,” another friend said to me years ago.
Yes, David and I are introspective and we talk about that introspection a lot. Â In fact this blog post is going up a day later than I’d planned because we got caught in a long, tedious and deeply introspective cycle of talk yesterday.
But that’s okay. Â We’re both old enough to be able to ride along with who we essentially are and make our way to the moments of appreciation and peace that the tedious process of introspection makes possible.
And how does this all relate to Albany other than Harry having made the comment there? Â The contrasts in that city between ornate historic buildings and vast modern buildings remind me of what it’s like inside my brain. Â Grand and multi-faceted, gray and flat, tall and wide, big in scope and rich in detail, simple and complex, all cycling in a swirl that lets me laugh at my own tedious habits and relish what they make accessible at the same time.
Above the Trees: April
Notice the title has changed; not above tree line, but above the trees. Â David and I got up Sunday morning with the intention of driving to the White Mountains to hike Mt. Pierce, fulfilling our New Year’s intention for April. Â But after a busy week of travel for family visits, and an upcoming week of more travel, we didn’t want to spend a good part of the day in the car. Â This intention was meant to help us make time to do something we enjoy, not to turn into a chore or an obligation. Â We already have plenty of those.
So we climbed Mt. Major, a small mountain south of Lake Winnipesaukee, bare granite at the top because of a long-ago fire, with beautiful views across the lake to the above tree line ridges of the White Mountains to the north.  We decided getting above the trees would do just fine, and it did.
We were home in time to sit in the sun, out of the wind, and let some of the new season sink in. Â We needed that.
Three Days, Three Cities, Interrupted
Yesterday David and I spent a few hours in Manhattan. Â We dropped Emilio off at daycare, took the train to Penn Station, and went for a walk — 7 miles, through the Greenmarket at Union Square, then down the Bowery through Chinatown and Little Italy and back up Broadway with a two-bags-full stop at the Strand Book Store. Â As we walked, I thought about our plans to spend today in Boston, ending with my reading with other WordTech poets at Boston Public Library. Â Then on Wednesday we had plans to spend time with Melia in Portland. Â Three days, three cities. Â Sweet.
Except yesterday ended in sorrow and dismay, and today was not what we planned, not what thousands of people in the Boston area had planned. Â There is so much sadness in the world due to natural causes, why does anyone do anything to add to it? Â I know that sounds ridiculously naive and innocent, but it’s a time of year that generates sadness as I move into the zone where I remember everything that was happening from seven years ago, as Eric’s grave illness was diagnosed and he got sicker and sicker. Â That grief gets layered with other losses and struggles of people I love dearly who are very close to me, people I care about who are a little further out, people I don’t know well but whose difficulties cross my path and send in ripples of sadness, people I don’t know at all, but whose losses happen in the public sphere and so we all know about it almost instantly and feel a flash of their pain. Â As we did yesterday.
Tomorrow we’re still planning to go to Portland, so it will be two cities in three days, with a swim through sorrow in between.
Spring Pleasure Preview
Traveling south this time of year, into a spring far advanced past its current muddy incarnation in New Hampshire, is a treat. Â David and I were in Knoxville, TN this weekend, to be the support team for Sam and his friend Mike as ran they ran their first marathon. Â Besides the pleasure of being with two smart, strong and very funny young men as they pushed their bodies pretty much to the breaking point, there was the delight of sunny days with temperatures in the 70s, and lines of dogwood trees showing off their white blossoms against blue skies. Â I’m ready for more of that, right here at home.
As we crossed a street on Saturday evening, littered with fallen petals, I thought of this poem, from years ago, realizing I will probably never stop noticing how trees shape-shift through the seasons.
Rising
What is the weight of a flower, the weight
of a tree bearing such blatant intent?
Every mass of blossoms, snow cloud,
exclamation, exuberance of fruit
to come, has a future, a history,
a moment of abandon, petals
splayed wide, drawing pollen to the core.
The wilt and decay towards apple
is hidden in new leaves, riches spent,
riches returned, petals salting the grass.
Last Ski
Alison and I did a last ski of the season on Sunday. Â Okay, maybe it wasn’t classic skiing. Â It was more like walking in the woods with skis attached to our boots, including literally walking in big ski steps across the open parts of the trail. Â At the height of our climb up Tarleton Road, just below the steep pitch to Neville Peak, there was still a good bit of snow, though it was very soft and wet.
But further down the trail, there were many spots where the snow was gone, so we skied around grass and sticks and rocks. Â At one point coming down a hill, one of my skis was gliding through the wet snow, the other slipping through a mud puddle. Â But we were skiing, celebrating a great season of snow.
A good ski year is always a reason to be grateful, and this year I’m also grateful on behalf of someone I love who has most likely had her last ski, period. Â As in she is so sick she most likely won’t be here during ski season next year, and if she is, she won’t be skiing. Â She could barely ski this year. Â I carry that reality with me, grateful for what I have and what I can do, and holding on to awareness of those I bring with me, those who can’t be out kicking and gliding through the frozen world themselves.
Above Tree Line: March
We walked into another world today — the alpine zone on the Franconia Ridge. Â Waking to a cloudy day that didn’t have a promising forecast, we kept moving with our plan to meet Ellen and hike today, knowing this was our last free day to get above tree line in March. Â As we drove up 93 towards the mountains, we could see the white peaks of Mt. Lafayette and Mt. Liberty gleaming in spots of sunshine, clouds breaking open to blue sky above us.
The sun was shining through the freshly snow showered trees as we started out on the Falling Waters Trail. Â But by the time we got to the falling water that gives the trail its name, the clouds had moved back in and soon after that it started snowing. Â It snowed the rest of the hike.
The trail was well packed under the few inches of new powder, so we had no trouble following the worn depression in the snow. Â The only trouble was when we accidentally stepped even inches off the track — posthole, a leg lost up to the crotch in snow.
The Falling Waters Trail is a steep climb up the west side of the ridge, but it was stunningly beautiful. Â Snow and ice on the river, snow on branches, snow on spruce, snow on our hats and our backs. Â Snow so deep ten foot trees looked four feet tall, and a sign that in summer is at head height was at my knees.
We kept trudging up and up and finally broke out into the alpine zone, above the trees, 3,000 feet above where we started. Â The view was mostly snow and cloud, with one ridge rising out of the fogginess to our south. Â Then we turned around and slid, slipped and glided down, another month’s above tree line intention done.
Spring Skiing
Spring began at 7:02 this morning, just as it started to snow again. Â Scattered flakes thickened, picked up speed and blew past the windows, accenting the black and white world outside. Â The flurry only lasted a few minutes, but it added to the 3″ of powder we got last night, on top of the 10″ we got yesterday.
Today is the Vernal Equinox, when daylight and darkness are equal. Â Now we slip over into each day being a bit longer than each night, a reason for celebration beyond the treat of having another day of skiing. Â I was sure an afternoon ski on wet snow last week was my last, because I knew it was going to rain the next day. Â I’m happy to have been wrong.
David and I finished our coffee and headed out to the trail, as we did yesterday. Â Thankfully a neighbor was out on his snowmobile last night, so we had the delight of skiing through a few inches of powder on top of a packed trail, rather than having to make our own track which is what we did yesterday. Â “I love how storms like this show the horizontal in the woods,” David said and I agreed, taking in the snow draped limbs surrounding us.
A few weeks ago I ran into a friend at the grocery store, and he heard the hesitation in my “Okay,” when he asked me how I was. Â When he asked what was wrong, I listed my latest set of worries and troubles.
“Well you never get 100%,” he said. Â “So I try to concentrate on the 65 or 75% I do get.”
Today marks 50% daylight, 50% darkness. Â And my attention to gratitude for the 75%.
March Flowers
Any blossom in March is a blessing. Â The pink geranium and oxalis plants have been with me for five years now; out on the porch each summer, back inside to winter over and send out flowers as a counter to the monochrome tones of winter.
But already there’s color in the hillsides of hardwoods, the faint blush of the buds just beginning to let go, responding to the lengthening light.  Here’s a  poem from year’s ago, that wonders about that color and what we see of light and dark.
Consequence
What if you failed to notice
low sun on the south trunk of the maple,
its shadow side already drifting
to dark, the horizon ready to assume
the indigo hue of the hillsides
of hardwood, winter tight buds?
We’re only given one run
at the sequence of consequence
that stems from noticing or not,
from being in the woods past dusk,
watching the sky grow grey,
laced by black maples.
Grace Mattern 