“I have been trying, for some time now, to find dignity in my loneliness. I have been finding this hard to do.”
-Maggie Nelson, Bluets

Dear Loneliness,

I feel like a crow-black-wingéd thing. Today marks one year. I tally the days like evidence. I do not know why, or what spherical time patterns do to the façade. A geometry of the soul. I have settled into this idea of without. I wander in lacy seclusion with a certain softness and wonder. The crows are here again. Four atop a barren fig tree, two on the fence. They have their morning assemblage; I am certain they watch me through the thin pane of glass, pitch-dark plumage. Heated bickering, exodus. The geography they choose to encompass perhaps they can illuminate.Ingrid Keir is co-founder of the WordParty, a San Francisco poetry and jazz open mic that has been ongoing for ten years. She lectures Creative Writing at San Francisco State University, where she received both her M.F.A and B.A degrees. She enjoys spontaneity whether it means reading with a jazz band, collaborating with artists, or creating visual poetry. Ingrid has written several chapbooks: The Secrets of Like (2004), Toward the Light (2007), and has been published in many literary journals including The Haight Ashbury Literary Journal, Sparkle and Blink, and Out of Our. Please see www.ingridkeir.com for more info.