Dear people,

Mailbox courtesy of y0s1a and sxc.hu

Today I will be frantically packing up all my overdue packages (including promised books--and that includes the great poetry giveaway going to Guy in Israel, as I am nothing if not a true-to-my-word procrastinator) because Obama is going to be hanging out and pronouncing on issues a mere one block away tomorrow, and that, people tell me, will be a navigational problem. Particularly because of the location of the Cooperstown post office . . .

Also, it seems I must weed my front borders in honor of the president. Because despite my 17 (husband-counted) trilliums, my bleeding hearts, my uvularia, my Jacks in the pulpit, my Virginia bluebells etcetera, my garden looks a little bit overpopulated with stray grasses.

And before I go off to sing in the evening, I hope to write a tiny story and simply must finish reading Deep Exegesis (Milosz, Sophocles, Bach, Joyce, Eliot, Melville, Marvell, Austen, and most of all scripture!) today or else roast for my sins, as I have promised to read it all the way to the end for the priests-and-clergy reading group of central New York. I am visiting their next meeting in the form of token poet and novelist, and I will tell you about it, as it is sure to be . . . different.

This means that I do not have time for a blog post. Kindly purchase all four of my in-print books if you miss me. (Insert adorable emoticons here.)

More news will no doubt materialize tomorrow, when I will be huddling inside my charming though somewhat decrepit federal house and hoping not to be noticed by all the snipers who locals say will be dashing about the rooftops. Bush no. 2 was once at a party at the house behind mine, and I managed not to see either the president on the lawn or the FBI in the alley, so I expect that I will manage a major bout of huddling perfectly well. (My mother, on the other hand, wants me to walk down the street so she can see me on CNN.)

Yrs, with packing string and skittles,
Marly