Don’t Burn Up On Re-Entry

(Why am I naming days?) (And what does it mean to “Help build the honeycomb?). 

7/9/13, Day 13, 760: Don’t Burn Up on Re-Entry

I crashed last night after pushing myself hard the past few days, and so I’ve named yesterday to remind myself that hitting the ground running can look a lot like crash and burn if you’re not careful (but I’m just so excited to be back and have some time again!)

So, last night, I also wrote another poem, prompted by this Times article, EM Lewis’ searing post on the TCG Circle and some stone-skipping at Lake Superior:

What I’ve Really Meant

To die is just another thing to do
But not until I find the words to say
What I’ve really meant all this time
I’ve gone on talking, talking.

The words will be simple, I hope,
Sea-smooth like rocks for skipping,
Skipping. Something for your pocket,
A trinket for your hands to worry on;

Or wait, maybe not words at all
But a touch that fits in your mouth
Like wine, like why; like when you came
To make all this time mean something.

Something like that. Or wait, maybe dying,
Maybe Death is the one going on and on and
We are the words, we are the touch, we
Are the thing it will never have time to say.

In addition to writing that poem yesterday, here are some other small ways I hopefully helped build the honeycomb:

• I asked the Senate to stop playing politics with our kids’ futures and to give the student loan bill an up-or-down vote. On July 1st, the interest rate on new federal Stafford student loans doubled from 3.4% to 6.8%, and I know too many f0lks struggling with this senseless increase.
• I worked an extra 2 hours at TCG
• I joined Daily Kos and People For the American Way by urging Congress to save the Voting Rights Act in light of the recent U.S. Supreme Court decision gutting it. Click here to sign the petition.
• I Signed the People’s Sign-on Letter to President Obama to reject seismic airgun testing in the Atlantic ».