Today I did some more reading in Trollope's "Can You Forgive Her?",  a book our discussion group is reading, and I continue to enjoy it. So far, there don't seem to be any profound, far-reaching themes in the book (it's probably not going to change my life in any appreciable way), but it's a well-told story, full of believable and thoroughly described characters. Trollope writes some of the smoothest and clearest sentences I've read recently, and the story, too, seems to be told in a smooth and clear way, which might be why an English professor friend of mine calls Trollope "the sanest of all novelists".

Anthony Trollope

Cia took a 9-mile hike today with her hiking buddies, Evelyn and Diane, in Pachaug State Forest (CT). Most of the trail was swampy and involved walking along old roads, but on the last 2 miles they walked among large rocky cliffs covered in lush moss, polypody ferns, and rock tripe.  The ground, she said, was covered with princess pine and club moss, and they really enjoyed the beauty of that part of the walk. The forest was covered, everywhere, with blowdowns from storms, as is probably always the case as winter comes to an end. They were solitary hikers today, meeting no one else on the trail in more than 5 hours. 

Polypody moss in Pachaug State Forest

My poem for today . . .

 SMILING HIS WAY TO SLEEP

He sometimes smiles his way to sleep.

As his eyes slowly close,

he sees all the towns

of this world, and the stars

starting their silver work

above the streets, and the limbs

of trees beside windows.

He knows the night is healing

the hills and homes,

and it makes him smile to see it

in his thoughts. All his thoughts,

in fact, make him smile

as they switch off like lamps

in the silent houses of sleep.