Sep 25, 2023 | Current Ned Note, On Writing, Past Notes, Poetry
Letter to the Person Who Carved His Initials into the Oldest Living Longleaf Pine in North America Tell me what it’s like to live without curiosity, without awe. To sail on clear water, rolling your eyes at the kelp reefs swaying beneath you, ignoring the...
Sep 15, 2023 | Current Ned Note, Past Notes, Poetry
Rosh Hashanah – Sept 15-17, 2023 new year. Ned Hayes Rosh Hashanah comes this year on a day of cool wind, a breathtaking portent of winter taking the world, rude lover tossing the sheets away. in autumn the sadness of all things is greatest for now the...
May 5, 2023 | Current Ned Note, On Writing, Past Notes, Poetry
May May, and among the miles of leafing, blossoms storm out of the darkness— windflowers and moccasin flowers. The bees dive into them and I too, to gather their spiritual honey. Mute and meek, yet theirs is the deepest certainty that this existence too— this sense of...
Mar 21, 2023 | Current Ned Note, On Writing, Poetry
A poem by Mary Oliver Spring And here is the serpent again, dragging himself out from his nest of darkness, his cave under the dark rocks, his winter-death. He slides over the pine needles. He loops around the branches of rising grass, looking for the sun. Well who...
Jan 10, 2023 | Current Ned Note, On Writing, Poetry
Today, Charles Simic’s death was announced. Here’s a wonderful memory of Simic by an old friend, Damon Krukowski. I share this with you now as a eulogy for a poet I admired and enjoyed deeply. Rest in peace, and poetry, Charles. Charon’s...
Oct 28, 2022 | Current Ned Note, On Writing, Past Notes, Poetry
A poem for this moment in our lives… (October 28, 2022) BY MAGGIE SMITH Life is short, though I keep this from my children. Life is short, and I’ve shortened mine in a thousand delicious, ill-advised ways, a thousand deliciously ill-advised ways I’ll keep from...
