Some Notes from Isolation

Humans are social creatures. This Isolation is not easy, not even for us poets and writers, we who have a reputation of being introverts. Yes, Henry David Thoreau went off alone to that cabin to contemplate, but he made that choice. We’re here at home, alone, maybe alone with our loved ones, and some days, even we loner poets feel quite lonely, quite stuck.

Like many others, I’m spending a lot of time at my desk. Some precious things hang on the wall in front of me. A painting by my friend Lisa. A piece of ceramic art that I bought in Paris sometime last millennium. A postcard of the cover of one of my books, with a post-it, a scrawled “Congratulations!” note from my publishers. A photo of my husband and me from the summer when we met. There is also an inspirational bookmark that I got when I graduated from Yoga Teacher Training. It was one of those “pick a card, any card” moments and the “quality” featured on the bookmark was meant to be taken as a kind of mantra for each student.

The one I randomly chose celebrates the idea of TAPAS. No, not those delicious Spanish small plates, but the yogic idea of discipline. I’ll translate a couple of the Sanskrit words here to tell you what it says: “Today I will cultivate discipline. I will plan a realistic, balanced schedule for my service, spiritual practice, and personal needs. I may not follow it exactly, but I will have it. I will save myself from the energy drains of trying to do too much from indecision and unclarity of purpose.”

These are helpful words for me during this time. We’re all keeping tight schedules for school, to keep the online teaching and learning flowing as smoothly as we can. But what to do with those other hours? Sometimes they feel endless; other times, they seem jam-packed with commitments and chores.

Tapas. Discipline. I’m trying, every day, to set that realistic schedule. I’ve found some great yoga classes online, taught by “famous” yoga teachers as well as by my friends—including my roommate from that Yoga Teacher Training experience. I make time in the morning to follow a video series whose goal is to spark a new poem every day. There’s lunch to cook and dinner to think about. There are the 47,000 books in my house that I haven’t read yet. Well, maybe that’s a slight exaggeration. But the bedside stack is slowly going down.

The realistic schedule also includes some very important appointments. My mother, brother, sister, and I FaceTime every Sunday evening, to talk and catch up, and to laugh at the crazy antics of our respective pets. Upon the inspiration of my eldest great-niece, the female side of my family has established a weekly, 4-Generation Little Women Book Club. At least every other week, I sit down for a chat with a friend who lives alone in a small village in the North of England. Every other week, too, I speak with a dear friend in Greece, who had her first baby not long before the isolation measures were put into place. She’s in a double sort of isolation, all the while learning how it is to be a mother. I confess that in the BC days, I often felt too busy to schedule a simple chat with a friend, even with my mother. Now these conversations are absolutely necessary.

There was a beautiful full moon the other week, the one that’s called the “pink moon.” Maybe you saw it. I was up late that night, I don’t remember why, but I realized that I wanted to take a picture of that gorgeous moon. I stuck my head out of the living room window to get a better shot. It was 3 in the morning and the air was cool, so clean and crisp I could just about taste the sweetness in it. The next morning, I told my husband about the air, that it tasted like the air in the hills of Umbria. We all know why the air now feels so sweet.

We don’t know what’s going to happen, how it will be, when we come out of our respective Isolations. I know that we’re all very much looking forward to seeing family and friends, colleagues and students, and to getting back to something like “normal.”

But I do hope that we’re able to hold on to some of the things we’ve learned during this unusual time. To hold very dear the people in our lives. To figure out how to take better care of the planet. To sit in the moment, alone, and just be. And just be fine.