Riffaterre

what is a reading
it is that
and some other things

idol ands

Almut and I have moved to Knoxville, Tennessee. We’ve been here a week, and there’s only one box left to unpack: books for which there was no shelf until I made one yesterday with wood from a set of box springs the last tenants left here. It’s nice to walk out in the morning and see the next little mountain through the haze or fog that gives these mountains their name. And I missed birds so much. There are so few kinds of birds and birdsongs in Iowa, but here there are mockingbirds(!), several kinds of finches, some sapsuckers, doves, cardinals, bluejays, robins, wood thrushes; those are the ones I’ve seen, but I hear others I can’t identify. And a couple of little five-line skinks live under or around our porch. And the South smells so much more alive than Iowa, so green and fresh, and the water quality is much, much better; my hair and skin no longer feel like I’ve gone over them with sandpaper after every shower. And I’m really looking forward to nonlethal winters!