Just now finished

~ An unseasonable yet awesome mug of coffee with hot chocolate,

~ Freddy and Fredericka by Mark Helprin, for which a review is forthcoming provided my ducks are not hostile to the notion of being put into rows,

~ A poem in the 2nd person, and, with it,

~ My eleventh notebook exclusively devoted to poetry.

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I'd be silly to equate productivity with good poetry; I've never allowed myself to confuse the two. Still, to pen a final encapsulating quotation on the inside rear cover ("I'll believe in anything" - Wolf Parade) and to fwap the book closed... these things lead, maybe twice a year, to just this moment of quiet, uncanny contentment.

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Health is O.K., incidentally. Thanks for all of your concern. I saw my doctor today, and despite a battery of tests he decided that, indeed, I remain the sort of strapping American youth you tend to see in all their raw profusion and staggering unremarkability in each one of these 50 industrious and budding states.