Books, Birds, Blood

Two novelists at Pacific Standard, on 4th between Bergen and St. Marks tonight. I hadn’t been there before, or known of it; when I lived on Bergen that block was desolate. They have a nice romper room/library in the back: I’ll return. Lydia Millet and Martha Southgate were the readers; I didn’t know of them, either, but they were good, too. Afterwards we were talking about this and that and the cry of the nighthawks over Brooklyn on hot muggy nights, which I’ve never heard, but I got some good pointers. When we left, at the corner of Bergen and 4th, she* said do you hear? I didn’t hear the first, but I heard the second honk. An uneven V of geese heading northwest.

There was a report in my email tonight of some 20,000 greater scaup out at Jamaica Bay, along with a paltry 500 snow geese.

Lately, when I take out my garbage, I’m worried my neighbors will wonder about me. Because the blood oranges this year are so dark they are almost purple, the scraps of pulp I thwap into the garbage after reaming makes the bags look like they’re splattered with uh, you know, bits of the local sprats.

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*She gave me a copy of one of her poetry collections; how exciting!