A Birthday Poem

Today I'm 29 again! I'll be spending the day outside.

Usually I like to take my kids to the pool or the lake, but today they have summer gym and then Walker has a scheduled chess demonstration from one of his teachers--the one who lives in Serbia--so we'll have to stick close to home. I might fill up a wading pool and read beside it in my back yard (despite the fact that our black cat Chester always ends up puncturing any inflatable parts when he presses down on one side so he can get a drink). The green and flowered wilderness of our yard is a lovely place to spend an afternoon with a book.

A Birthday Poem, by Ted Kooser

Just past dawn, the sun stands
with its heavy red head
in a black stanchion of trees,
waiting for someone to come
with his bucket
for the foamy white light,
and then a long day in the pasture.
I too spend my days grazing,
feasting on every green moment
till darkness calls,
and with the others
I walk away into the night,
swinging the little tin bell
of my name.

Yes, I think I'll be outside until the cows come home--they live diagonally across the street and over the hill. You can see them lying in the shade under the tree in the bottom photo.