The priest and the doctor in their long coats, running over the fields
The priest and the doctor in their long coats, running over the fields
could be the start of some joke, or
what a town on its knees
looks like. This city, after all,
is a maybe at survival. Between
the faults and the fault lines,
Tahoma’s flicked thumb.
White coat, white collar, white sky
yeah - it’s a timebomb.
But it’s winter, the snow and wet
provides a few feet
of reassurance… scientific, or otherwise.
Besides, the spell of beauty is enough.
—
Out of the wreck - the sweetest
blackberries, not the invasive but
the trailing,
the larches,
the pines, with time,
the lichen and
surely the birds would have seen the signs.
Surely the birds
The title is from a poem by Phillip Larkin
When I read Romeo and Juliet in high school I remember we spent more time than necessary discussing the scene where Sampson bites his thumb at Abram. And he’s like “do you bite your thumb at us?” and Sampson is like “Nah, but I do bite my thumb.” Classic. Apparently biting one’s thumb and then flicking it from behind your teeth was an old (and less sanitary) way of giving someone the finger. The profile of Mt. Tahoma has this funny little nub that always looks like a thumb to me… maybe its telling us something.
Growing up my dad’s band, Old Band Wallace, used to cover the song Timebomb by the punk band Rancid - I’m not sure I’ve ever heard the real song but their version is stuck in my head this morning. “White coat, white collar, white sky, yeah - it’s a timebomb.” Is a play on the chorus of that song.
One time D and I were looking up information about the blackberries found all over the Northwest and we stumbled upon this very eloquent and sassy comment from a woman defending the native blackberry and ripping into the Himalayan variety. I still think about it sometimes… digital land stewardship?
Thank you for reading.
Know somebody who would enjoy these poems/songs on a weekly basis? It would mean a lot to me if you shared Into Wind with them!