The poet and novelist Marge Piercy has a gift for writing about nature. In this poem, springtime has a nearly overwhelming and contagious energy, capturing the action-filled drama of spring. [Introduction by Ted Kooser.]

More Than Enough

The first lily of June opens its red mouth.

All over the sand road where we walk

multiflora rose climbs trees cascading

white or pink blossoms, simple, intense

the scene drifting like colored mist.

The arrowhead is spreading its creamy

clumps of flower and the blackberries

are blooming in the thickets. Season of

joy for the bee. The green will never

again be so green, so purely and lushly

new, grass lifting its wheaty seedheads

into the wind. Rich fresh wine

of June, we stagger into you smeared

with pollen, overcome as the turtle

laying her eggs in roadside sand.

Whew. We did it. It took all three of us, but we got him through the public school system. He graduated (with honors, even). Congratulations, Nick! On to the next adventure.

In honor of my son’s high school graduation tomorrow, here are a few graduation/growing up-themed quotes:

“There is a good reason they call these ceremonies ‘commencement exercises.’ Graduation is not the end; it’s the beginning.”

—Orrin Hatch

“The fireworks begin today. Each diploma is a lighted match. Each one of you is a fuse.”

—Edward Koch

And my favorite:

“It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are.”

—e.e. cummings

Today, we won’t be going to the beach or having a cookout—typical Memorial Day activities. We’ll be giving the house a good cleaning before all the grandparents arrive tomorrow for Nick’s high school graduation later in the week—an event that merits a holiday of its own in my book.

Hope you all have a happy, relaxing and meaningful Memorial Day.

Did you know about the National Moment of Remembrance? I did not. According to the U.S. Veterans Affairs website, “The National Moment of Remembrance encourages all Americans to pause wherever they are at 3 p.m. local time on Memorial Day for a minute of silence to remember and honor those who have died in service to the nation.”

I always have piles of books lying around: books in progress, books lined up for one of the reading challenges I’m doing, books I’ve finished reading, but want to reread select parts of or write notes about. But the very best pile of all is the one of books next up to be read. I got this little pile at the library this week, except for the top one which I own and had already started to read. Here’s what I got:

What I Learned at Bug Camp, Sarah Juniper Rabkin. I’m always on the lookout for collections of essays, and I read about this one on Susan J. Tweit’s blog. Rabkin is a naturalist, artist and teacher, and I’m very much enjoying her thoughtful writing.

The Muse Is IN: An Owner’s Manual to Your Creativity, Jill Badonsky. This brightly-illustrated book looks like a fun jump start to creativity. It might help me with my proposed 30 Days of Creativity (coming soon!).

The Cursing Mommy’s Book of Days, Ian Frazier. A humorous novel written in daybook form, the main character is a “hilariously desperate housewife with a taste for swearing and large glasses of red wine, who speaks to the frustrations of everyday life.” I read about this in the New York Times, and it sounds like a good antidote to stress, don’t you think?

Moving to Higher Ground, Wynton Marsalis with Geoffrey C. Ward. Marsalis writes about lessons learned in a lifetime in jazz—I’m quite excited about finally checking this out, because it’s one of the books that’s been on my TBR list the longest!

Gone Girl, Gillian Flynn. The novel that made such a splash last year, apparently a twisty/turny thriller. I’m looking forward to seeing what the fuss was all about.

I’ll have to start Gone Girl first because there are people signed up after me to read it and I won’t be able to renew it after the checkout period is over. This might be a challenge, because next week will be given up to entertaining out-of-town family and celebrating my son’s graduation from high school. Surely I’ll be able to sneak a little reading time in there. I hope.

In addition to piles of books, I have lists of books. On Sunday I spent an hour puttering through my TBR list, consolidating and updating. I’d finished a book, and wandered through the library catalog looking for something new to put on hold (see pile above for the result). I checked reviews on Amazon to see if I still wanted to read a few books that had been on my list for a while, crossing out a few, but mostly transferring them to a clean page in my organizer. My library recently changed its cataloging system, and it took me a little while to figure out how to best use it.  Occasionally, a book on my list will disappear from the catalog and I have to decide if I want to try interlibrary loan, buy a copy, or discard the book from my TBR list. Momentous decisions!