I don’t believe in certainty. And I think that puts me at odds with society. When they come calling about politics or religion (increasingly it is more popular to speak against religion how ghastly). Because I take no position because I only see grey there is no black and white why when I devote my life to becoming one with the whole shall I put up walls? Never have I heard an argument in through which I could not easily poke a hole. Not that poking holes is something I’m after… but how are you so certain in this uncertain world? Certainty is absurd. And shallow and egotistical and I’ve chosen to disengage with it because I walk in nature and I keep a small garden and there are many animals who have made meals of my chicks and chickens… it’s forced me to reconsider all sorts of things like what is violence and is it evil and can it also be good? And there have been enough wars over many millennia to inspire such grappling my questions are ancient they are just new to me why are we so certain? It is a sign of bad times when one is accused for conversation for ideas for questions yes yes bad times for thinking and so I keep such thoughts to myself and I cross the road when the democrats are picketing and I move on at the farmers market when the republicans are whining I go into the garden and count my cucumbers and squash blossoms and peppers and tomatoes I’ve no desire to speak or even think about the mass of men and what they get up to leading their lives of quiet desperation—but do they know of this desperation? I’ve no desire for criticism and when I read the writings of Thoreau I wonder if despite his many criticisms did he want them? Or were they inevitable? It is said that he wanted to inspire people to go into nature but did he or is that assumed? I do not care what society does without me if They wish not to go to nature all the better. There are not enough wild berries for all of us. Nor are there enough quiet spaces or untrodden paths and Thoreau said I should not talk so much about myself if there were anybody else whom I knew so well. And yes what do I know of other men and women what do I know of Man? What do I know about Their thoughts and dreams about the right thoughts and dreams about the wrong thoughts and dreams…. No I’ve no desire for criticism but there is the nastiness of the outside world putting itself onto me yes I disagree with the liquor laws the licensing the bureaucracy the control and I’m learning how to live with it I’m learning how and when and where to go around it you see there is nothing in me today that wishes to speak on such matters to reflect on such matters this tug-of-war this dichotomy between men and Man why do men insist on bothering me? I wish to be left alone. Thou shalt not kill thou shalt not covet they neighbor’s wife yes yes but when did it become thou shalt not install an outdoor shower without a permit and thou shalt not serve wild venison and if I put my canoe into the water to paddle up and down creeks why must I surrender my liberty to the State boating by the questioning the inspecting for a few fish when they pay farmers to rape the earth corn soy wheat millions of acres why am I not free to harvest the wild things that were not created by nor rightfully owned by tyranny? Yes yes you see the criticism manifests when they take man’s liberty when it is impossible for him to be free like the fish the deer the eagle the fowl the fox yes the tyranny they put up walls they force me to be cunning cunning cunning I become the fox to be free when I’d rather ponder over the butterfly and bee yes yes so I take myself on long and quiet walks I take myself away so it all stops ringing in my ears there are things to consider of far greater importance like the peace I feel with my vegetables and the anxiety and sadness I feel with my ducks. My poor boys. I raised him and I chased after him—you see the animals always run—and I caught him and I carried him thirty yards to his death chamber as he stared at me quietly quacking black eyes framed in a head of velvet green that illuminates the burgundy blood. And the death throes shiver through me. But the first cucumber picked from the vine is something entirely else. And the first tomatoes what a lovely perfume. And the soft herbs and plethora of peppers—still green but promising. The zucchini and green beans. And wild wineberries in thorny brambles on the side of the house. Yes it is all peace and pleasure the magical fruits of the earth there is no somber death march the harvest of the summer bounty is all jubilee—emancipation from flesh. And I walk the country trails surrounded in lush meadows and rows of corn until I reach the woods and lining them for acres and acres and acres are blackberries and among the brambles is elderflower and honeysuckle and mugwort and chicory and yarrow and sumac and Adam’s needle and into the forest creeping on the floor is spotted wintergreen and as I push closer toward the riverbank the pawpaw trees pop up by the thousands. And the Sassafras leaves are a wonder. And the frogs big and small hop in scores. And toward the end of the creeks the lotus grows soon to bloom and I’ll paddle through them buds of subtle sweetness clean and crisp electric and when the flowers die white turns to black the sticky roots are at their sweetest. And I’ll venture into cooling waters at low tide…

     And there’s quiet now but for the rustling through green leaves and subtle snaps of harvested vegetables. I can hear winter death memories. The duck’s body against the shed. The only sounds in damping snow. Inhale cold air into lungs and clean blood from hands wiping on ice. Yes there is a greater silence in winter framing the harvest and it is not dramatic it isn’t unbearable no but I’m listening. And as the summer harvest has begun I’m remembering. And I’m thinking something inside me in wintertime will have shifted enough away from vined fruit to ease the taking of waddling flesh. It isn’t a moral quandary. But as I count how many ducks I’ll need to raise to get me through the winter I count how many ducks I’ll carry to their death and still carry inside me when the season again turns from wolf to strawberry moons and

I’m working some things out this week. In the meantime, I hope you enjoy these photographs captured on my early summer walks.

“Some have asked what I got to eat; if I did not feel lonesome; if I was not afraid…” (HDT, Walden)

     I have not settled in the rural woods inside a self-built hut. Though compared to what is thought as a normal restaurant perhaps I have done something of the sort… I live a certain way and that is it. You may choose to call it what you want but I don’t identify. The wind does not call itself the wind. The sun does not call itself the sun. I do not call whatever I place onto the plate Art—it is a result. My life is my Art—the way I live.

  “It is something to be able to paint a certain picture, or carve a statue, and so to make a few objects beautiful; but it is far more glorious to carve and paint the very atmosphere and medium through which we look, which we morally can do.” (HDT, Walden)

     We’ve gotten busier at the restaurant and the requests pile in from those who do not know us because they have not taken the time to know us. And what can I do? I cannot break myself into one hundred pieces for them. How would I return? I would be broken, and when I worked so very hard to build within me a great temple. And while the restaurant reflects but a small portion of my thoughts—the physical is always so far behind—a church is a church whether only its first brick has been laid or its last. Yes this is a country church of sorts. A place that celebrates the divinity that is within man and all around him.

And God said, Let us make Man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. (KJV Genesis 1:26-27)

     With Man’s dominion came a profound responsibility of stewardship. There are many examples of God’s wrath when Man’s stewardship faltered. And where is his wrath now after we’ve buried Him to exploit the earth? (nothing is free). There are many forms of stewardship and they are all a devotion and many may make little sense to others. Little sense little sense little sense to others have we always been this way and who do our insipid comparisons serve? I am a steward of my time and my place and not the world as represented by others. Personal. Personal. Personal. But here there is often a miscalculation from the outside world: some tell me my writing is brave… how vulnerable I am. But this is not that heavy. Our feelings are not so very different from one another nor from those who have come before us and those who will follow—you are just afraid of them. But I did not plan this stewardship no I’ve written no dogma. I do not lead. I follow the invisible force that is always within and all around me. Driving home on the old familiar route the sun sets pinks across the fields and creek. White tail silhouettes on darkening pasture. Winter fires burn bright though they hardly compare to a pastoral summer’s night. I’m returning home through painted twilight to tuck my girls into bed. To read them a bedtime story. To lie with them until they drift to sleep. Yes they’re getting older now but they still like to fall asleep in our arms. And we oblige because one day soon they won’t ask us to. I can’t think of something better to hurry home for, to keep the knife strokes sharp and focused. And so I butchered the chickens with efficiency and placed them in the brine of goat’s milk whey and salt and maple syrup. And I soaped the countertop and wiped away the day. And fed the starter. And turned off the lights and locked the doors. The little ones were waiting for me. And as something of a reward (though lying next to my angels is reward enough) the finished day cascaded in splendor all around me.

I don’t know this world as I think others know it. I see them go from place to place from thing to thing. To the next to the next. No I cannot break from the spirit of things. I carry them. They follow me. I cannot pass them. I cannot move from them so quickly… The spirit captures me and I capture it in return. Our bodies intertwine. Whether in food or words or pictures there is no beginning or end but a tide we reach we pull we fade.

     And this evening when it wasn’t night but it was no longer day I pulled over onto the dirt at the side of the soy field on Bessicks Corner Road and turned off my headlights and stared out into the opening of light through the dark I stared I stared. And I walked along the road and the fireflies were there with me and a herd of deer galloped across the field in front of me oh majestic earth… And I wondered what it would be like to return to it. To be with it and in it. We’ve moved so very far from it. I was born out of it. What would it be like to return to it… to be like the deer.

I wish to speak a word for Nature, for absolute freedom and
wildness, as contrasted with a freedom and culture merely
civil–to regard man as an inhabitant, or a part and parcel of
Nature, rather than a member of society. I wish to make an
extreme statement, if so I may make an emphatic one, for there
are enough champions of civilization: the minister and the school
committee and every one of you will take care of that.

(Henry David Thoreau, Walking)

     And at Still Pond Creek the fish stopped jumping and the sun set and I didn’t chase after it. Where do the stars grow… for me… Because I wonder over the night hovering above still water. And I wonder over the night held tight in skin and bones. And inside—I’m becoming aware—I know as little about why why WHY as whatever grows beyond the sky. And they ask are you happy? and I smile and nod with the stroke of the knife. I hope I am not happy: when the moon is full it begins to wane. And now I feel the night strong within me how it crept… silently quietly creeping until dark overtook light. And I’m carrying it with me now. And rooster will crow. The sun also ariseth, and the sun goeth down, and hasteth to his place where he arose. (Ecclesiastes 1:5)