warmest birthday wishes

to our darling boy, whose voice was so light today, and so warm, that my heart went all aflutter

to our beauty, who spent the night on or around my feet in the most gerdaloo shape possible

... with all my love

sat at my desk this morning and wept with the unexpected shock of nostalgia, sent from across the ocean, from an unlikely source, from a rare beauty

Muslim Magomaev, with the charming name so clearly evocative of his rich cultural background, the "King of Songs," the pop star with the voice of an opera singer, entreating the sea to take him far, far way

Сердце, как друга море встречает 
Сердце, как песня летит из груди 

The heart, like a friend, is met by the sea
The heart, like a song, flies from your chest

weighty [paraphrased] words from Canadian Nancy Heslin, Editor-in-Chief of the Riviera Reporter, who spoke about the enclaves of the disaffected, the marginalized. She has lived in Nice for 15 years; she has received French citizenship; but she will "never feel French; they will never let you. This is not a problem of Islam and the West."

inspired by/based on an old blog post: Platonism

my life in pictures

it's after many, many years that i've started posting photos again--and, because it's not the medium i'm used to, i can't help but sprinkle in writing along the periphery. i handwrite other people's poetry because it makes me feel closer to the text; i take a picture because i like the look of pen on paper. as with everything, i'm at risk of over-sharing.

https://www.instagram.com/adva_kate/

عيد مبارك

crowds of worshipers on their way to the local mosque this morning signalled the end of Ramadan.. kurta, taqiyah, keffiyeh glowing in the blistering heat

how inexplicably beautiful they looked to me... and how the scene froze in my mind as one of great comfort

faced, today, with the terrible limits of language...
trying so hard to relay all the warmth in my heart

Oh, the wind, the wind is blowing,
through the graves the wind is blowing

i was always under the impression that i've loved people more than they've loved me--that it was a blessing and a curse, but whatever it was, it was permanent. it occurs to me now that, with the exception of one, perhaps i've simply always loved those who are less expressive than i am.

i'm a disgrace to gardening and to raspberries.

there is zero concentration happening here.
zero zero zero
none

in typical Jewish fashion, behind every one of my happy moments is its mirror image of grief

yesterday, a resident of emma's building asked me whose granddaughter i am. the look on her face, when i told her, said, oh dear... oh dear

Pacinthe Mattar, associate producer at CBC Radio One, discusses her struggle with impostor syndrome here. Ignore the fact that the article unnecessarily stresses negative comments she received along the way--the condition is totally unrelated to level of support. Also, not included in the piece is what she said in an interview on Metro News Morning: that naming what scared her was a crucial part of her reconciliation with herself.

my hair smells like cilantro

the valleys

f's phrase of the week

It can't be an Iranian last name; Namir means "don't die": نمیر، بمیر، مرد

today's waterfall of droppage began with my beautiful bunny mug--which shattered into several pieces and left an ugly stain of ugly tea on an already ugly office carpet--and quickly spiralled out of control to include both the usual victims (pens, highlighters, mail, cell phone, security pass) and a few less-usual ones (a loaf of bread, a candy, a box of cookies).

my body, it seems, is rebelling against some unknown trouble in the form of unsteady, shaky hands--which is not (unfortunately for everything i own, and my clothing, and my office space), a rare side-effect, as the number of journal entries on this topic will prove.........

years ago, one of the judges for the CBC Poetry Prize commented on the abundance of mundane, unoriginal submissions. to write better poetry, she said, one must read poetry, too. but what happens when reading it throws you into fits of doubt, humiliation, depression...

friends have remarked recently that i'm crippled by the need to be formally acknowledged.
i guess i am.

i guess that means i'm stuck here..

because my mind is going places it shouldn't

i have to leave. i have to stop at the gas station. i need to eat. i need to go for a bike ride. i have to watch Luther. i need to talk. i need to make my loved ones laugh. i have to check on my raspberries. i have to sleep. i need to write. i need to write.