1. 4:34 am. 

2. My teeth hurt. I must have been grinding extra hard last night. Must make a note to relax my jaw today.

3. Still so dark. I rush and put on my boots and coat to take the trash bins out. A think layer of glass over everything. I let the weight of trash bins pull me down the driveway as if I'm on skates.

4. Him taking the kids to school gives me just 20 very glorious minutes of alone time in the house to clean up the evidence of living.

5. Wendell Berry's "How To Be A Poet." Communicate Slowly. Live a three-dimensional life...

6. I move my computer upstairs to the bedroom for a change of scenery. I just didn't feel like today could be another day at the dining room table. Plus I need to move away from the reminders of all that needs to be done. 

7. Can I even get all of this done by Monday? It's all happening so quickly and yet so slowly and it is hard to hold.

8. I want to just write poetry. I think about the freedom that might come from some other kind of work that is not based on my own creativity. Would there be more space to dream?

9. Bare black branches against the grayed out sky. The golden-brown of the dormant grass on the berm. Little hints of green in the grass where the snow has melted away. 

10. I am ready for this.