Poem of the day:

Dear Colette
Erica Jong

Dear Colette,
I want to write to you
about being a woman
for that is what you write to me.

I want to tell you how your face
enduring after thirty, forty, fifty. . .
hangs above my desk
like my own muse.

I want to tell you how your hands
reach out from your books
& seize my heart.

I want to tell you how your hair
electrifies my thoughts
like my own halo.

I want to tell you how your eyes
penetrate my fear
& make it melt.

I want to tell you
simply that I love you--
though you are "dead"
& I am still "alive."

Suicides & spinsters--
all our kind!

Even decorous Jane Austen
never marrying,
& Sappho leaping,
& Sylvia in the oven,
& Anna Wickham, Tsvetaeva, Sara Teasdale,
& pale Virginia floating like Ophelia,
& Emily alone, alone, alone. . . .

But you endure & marry,
go on writing,
lose a husband, gain a husband,
go on writing,
sing & tap dance
& you go on writing,
have a child & still
you go on writing,
love a woman, love a man
& go on writing.
You endure your writing
& your life.

Dear Colette,
I only want to thank you:

for your eyes ringed
with bluest paint like bruises,
for your hair gathering sparks
like brush fire,
for your hands which never willingly
let go,
for your years, your child, your lovers,
all your books. . . .

Dear Colette,
you hold me
to this life.

Okay, I started reading Fear of Flying last night, and I think it impacted my dream. My dream was so strange that as soon as someone's rude honking at the gate woke me up early this morning, I went to work writing it down in my journal. Now I'm remembering more about my dream - like my old roommate scoffing me in front of a group of people. Which she never did in real life, it just feels that way.

Last night I also did an interview for MoveOn with a woman in Maryland (D.C. area). I'm so glad I got to talk to her because we have so much in common, even though our backgrounds seem very different. I hope we keep in touch, because she really seems like a grand dame.=) I hope our interview results help MoveOn with whatever they are doing. Our answers to the questions were somewhat similar, so I wonder if other people had the same results we did. I guess we'll see. . .

CD of the day: Aimee Mann, Bachelor No. 2. Good stuff.