Both Here and There: Cork, Seattle, and The Butter Museum

The Butter Museum, Cork

The phone just rang and it was my friend the poet Geraldine Mills calling just to say hello. Since we are in the same country at the moment and in the same time zone, it's a great treat. Tomorrow I hope to see friends in Dublin before heading home. If only Seattle wasn't a 12 hour plane ride away.

My friend the Canadian poet Kimberly Fahner has been chronicling our time at Anam Cara with far more detail than I've managed this week. If you are interested in Irish folklore told with humor and intelligence you might want to check out The Republic of Poetry. Kim's second full length collection comes out this year and I for one can't wait!

This is my 4th time in Ireland and that's perhaps more times than I've ever been to any other country. It makes me think that there is a real energy for me here. I feel alive in my own skin and connected to the rain and the preponderance of bookshops and poets, woolen sweaters and frequent cups of tea. And did I mention the best butter in the world? (Well the world as I know it.)

Here's to travel which wakes me up and makes me glad to be alive.