Rufous Fantail

Dinner's on the stove, there's cloud cover, wind whipping up, the hope of rain, and someone I love is hurting. It's been an odd, interrupted, lovely, loving day.

This is the rufous fantail, in a picture by Brett Donald. "Rufous" means red. I learned that by reading and submitting to Rufous City Review, "where industry encounters raw earth."  I have a poem called "Glimpse of Red" in the current issue.

One thing I love about being published is that I get to read everybody else's poems! I learn & feel so much. And, in this issue, I also love the center section of collage art!

Another thing I love about Rufous City Review, and what drew me to submit, was its list of what it contains: "rusted memories; russet sparrows; random whimsy; really great writing." A list (a longer list, of which this is a section) punctuated with semi-colons.* If you know me or have read my blog for a while, you know I love "random whimsy."

*If you know me, or my mom, or Ron Hardy, or the play Wit (aka W;t), or if you read Marilynne Robinson, you, too, might love semi-colons, or the fact that the Rufous City Review list is punctuated with them.

My poem not only has a glimpse of red in it, but also some rust.

This is the rufous-headed hornbill, aka the writhe-billed hornbill, aka "Dulungan," thanks to Callan Bentley. Remember the hornbill in The Lion King? "Didn't your mother ever teach you not to play with your food?"

Oops, better check the black beans and rice!