That was the first day.

First day of the semester: done.

Second day of the semester: coming right up.

Here's what went right: I was able to finish the syllabus for my second day of the semester class during the periods of time when no students showed up for my first day orientations to their online classes.

On the other hand: practically no students showed up for those orientations.

However: I am not worrying about it. Not yet, or not much.

To compensate: I opened the shade in my office a little higher to capture the little afternoon light diffusing through the rain, and worked and worked away, doing a little online orienting here and there, eating beautiful carrots and fennel and a pink orange.

And then: I went and worked out and drove home, starving like a savage.

And then: I fell asleep while I was reading Go Fug Yourself. #tragic

And then: I watched two hours of television, more or less. Okay, more.

While: working on the calendar for my second day class.

And also: sorting out this and that about other work I need to do. Adding to my lists of things that need to be finished.

Thus: making myself feel a little panicky.

In conclusion: After a day of steady rain, it's now snowing. We took our late night constitutional and left both human and dog tracks coming and going. I'm about to sleep the sleep of the new semester, of the stood-up teacher, of the still-planning, of the not-yet-panicked. Or at least the sleep of the not-much-panicked.

Incoming.

Here's the poem I took to my group yesterday, with some revisions based on their feedback:

For days on end it snows

I’ve had enough of this quiet, woven of baffled fans,
sleep, and everyone gone. Out of our bed, I want a nest

made of newspaper, dogs, books, children, music and chatter.
In the night I wake, expect to hear her huff and shift.

At the end she lay her head on her paws. For as long
as we wanted, we could still stroke her soft ears.

Downstairs, a bedroom no one sleeps in,
the bed unmade, discarded socks dimly remembering

their former feet. The bird once trapped there, beating.
Medallions, pennants, trophies. I ready myself to order it.

I should open the door, let everything out that wants out,
let stillness settle before I arrive with my heave and flow.

On the lawn up the street, snowmen, four of them,
still and cold. On his walk, our other dog abruptly

bristles and growls at them: something amiss,
a new series of masters, white overlords aligned

suddenly in the yard he used to sniff and prowl.
I always loved waking to what had fallen in the night:

first thing, she’d bury her face in it,
then lie down, the snow like a mother.