Me gustas cuando callas

I like for you to be still: it is as though you were absent,
and you hear me from far away and my voice does not touch you.
It seems as though your eyes had flown away
and it seems that a kiss had sealed your mouth.

As all things are filled with my soul
you emerge from the things, filled with my soul.
You are like my soul, a butterfly of dream,
and you are like the word Melancholy.

I like for you to be still, and you seem far away.
It sounds as though you were lamenting, a butterfly cooing like a dove.
And you hear me from far away, and my voice does not reach you:
Let me come to be still in your silence.

And let me talk to you with your silence
that is bright as a lamp, simple as a ring.
You are like the night, with its stillness and constellations.
Your silence is that of a star, as remote and candid.

I like for you to be still: it is as though you were absent,
distant and full of sorrow as though you had died.
One word then, one smile, is enough.
And I am happy, happy that it's not true.

Pablo Neruda

National Book Festival

I'm ready to be back to sharing my thoughts. I guess I've realized that I have a hard time adjusting to new things. Change sometimes is hard for me and in the past couple of years I've become better about not venting my emotions but letting them out in small careful doses. Yesterday, I got to do something that made me so excited that I decided it would be the first thing I would write about after my short absence here.

At school on Friday one of my co-workers asked me if I was going to the National Book Festival and I said that I didn't know it was happening but, I was going to look it up! I didn't remember until late on Friday night when looked it up and I realized that Marilynne Robinson,the author of the book Gilead, was going to be there! I was so excited.

So, yesterday my friend Will and I walked down to the National Mall (in the rain) and stood in line to get her to sign our book. Julia Alvarez, the author of another book I'd read recently was signing just next to her but, I could only stand in one line at a time. Then we sat under a huge tent to hear Marilynne read part of her book Home. I thought it was great fun. If you haven't read Gilead book you should.

It was so fun to be in a place full of people who like to read, I felt quite at home!

Organizing and waiting

Ever since I got back to DC I've felt a bit less motivated to be social than I'd been in the past. I guess my emotional energy is directed elsewhere. A large part of it is being spent at the Elementary School where I'm working and I think that is good. I feel happy and tired all at the same time.

I'm happy...