Tried to watch TV last night. Fell asleep on the couch, in front of the fire. Woke up in the middle of the eleven o’clock news. The fire was nearly embers. Shut off of the TV. Went to bed. This morning the TV was off and there were embers enough to begin again. Going running now. Coming back to a fire in the fireplace, coffee and the sacred quiet of a winter’s morning.

“The woods are lovely, dark and deep./But I have promises to keep,/And miles to go before I sleep,/…” Robert Frost said that. The poet’s woods, a church of my own choosing, the crunch of frozen trail beneath my summer shoes, a cathedral sky; a world of men and obligation is over there, just out of sight.

When I get home the fire is low, in need of wood. The coffee is cold.

The words are waiting.