Emily Brisse

Hello world, What an autumn, huh? In Minnesota, the weather has been fantastically long and glorious. We didn't have our first frost until just before Thanksgiving. That meant a lot of time outside, and some grateful leniency with how long we had to rake up all those millions of yellow leaves. And also, there was the election in there, which threw everyone I knew for a loop, no matter which side of the political line they landed on. It's still something many of us are sifting through, and the mess has been hard to see around at times. But it all keeps moving forward, doesn't it? I'm holding as many people's hands as I can. As we crest into the holiday season, however, I've decided to focus on how very much I have to be thankful for. Did you know that there's a lot of research on how practicing intentional gratitude on a daily basis actually has positive effects on one's health ? It's no shock to me, but I like knowing there is science behind it....

Littlest One, It is snowing outside. Last week the grass was green, my begonias still vaunting their soft pink petals. And tonight, your brother asleep, the night a quiet dark, I watch the way the white changes everything over into something new. You do not know yet, the way things fall at different speeds. You do not know yet, the way a cup of hot tea can calm. You do not know yet, the feel of soil between your fingers. You do not know yet, the sound of singing. You do not know yet, the possibilities of a daydream. You do not know yet, the scent of wood smoke. You do not know yet, the pleasures of the body. You do not know yet, how humans can disappoint. You do not know yet, this snow softly falling, this apple on my tongue, how beautiful and fragile it all can seem. I have tried to guide your brother. “Look,” I tell him. “Look up, look low, look there, look under, smell that, touch this, listen to that crow that chickadee that owl. Breathe...

Because sometimes you need to think not cold but warmth. Because sometimes you need to think not dark but light. Because sometimes you need to think not fall back but spring forward . Here's an old essay, friends, that I first tapped out right here in this space that has, in the meantime, become a newish thing, a reminder that we can find a balance between two unsteady places. Visit the most recent online issue of The Fourth River , and once you open the PDF, read the other wonderful stories, essays, and poems, and then find my essay "Spring Forward," on page 96, at the very back. Thanks for reading. And believing in the transformative power of art. It is what will save us. It is what always has.

Hi Friends, I'll be saying this with a sigh, but O Summer!  I am already deep into classes with my students, and where it does feel good to be back with young minds talking about things that matter, summer is a particular treasure. We were everyday outside, at parks, at beaches, in lakes and rivers and streams, up to our armpits in our garden flowers. We also spent a lot of time with family and friends, at cabins, birthday parties, splashpads, and swimming lessons. My boy learned to fish. He wanted to fish every day. He would spot the earthworm wiggling into the hole behind the branch and grab it, lift it up, study its perfectly spaced indentations. I watched his body lengthen, and I listened to him tell me stories, and it is a little astonishing to me, that I have been in this world for three and a half years with him, and he is still articulating things with the lift of his eyelashes that I hadn't known existed. I am a proud mama, a happy mama, a mama thankful for a seaso...

Taking a break from my plant-focused summer to point you all to a recent publication of mine in Hippocampus Magazine. It's a very short essay, called "I Am Still Here," which focuses on my immediate reaction twenty-some years ago to the abduction of a neighborhood boy. As one would assume, the events surrounding his kidnapping haunted me as a young girl, and still do. For me, writing is generally a matter of trying to figure something out. This boy's case has now gone unresolved for decades. I doubt I will ever stop writing into the center of that night, not at least until some closure is reached. So: there's that. Not flowers or bouncing summer grasses. But one of my earliest memories of understanding the necessity of story, and how upturned and unstable things can feel without one. Also, as a result of this essay, a young woman from a college in Massachusetts read it, and asked for a short interview for one of her classes about publishing. I'm inclu...

    Another installment of Name-That-Plant-Growing-in-the-Marsh: Bittersweet nightshade Eastern daisy fleabane (aster family) Some kind of lovely leaf -- who knows what this is??? Daisy Creeping bellflower ? ? Some kind of grass ??? Motherwort Clover ? Common mullein My boy, out in it all Quite a few plants I couldn't identify this month, folks, so I need your help. What did I get right? What did I miss? Goodness, this world is a wild and beautiful place.

    For those of you who have been here since the very beginning of Landing on Cloudy Water, you might remember my early attempts to learn and document the names of what I saw growing around me. First there was the snowdrop , then the Siberian squill , then the forsythia , then the tarda tulip , and finally the wild columbine. Well, a child came into my life a bit after all that, and naming him, I suppose, claimed my attention. I am happy to say, though, that he is now at the age where he wants to know what he's seeing, and that has given me new cause to do the same. So, I bring you yet again, a series in wild identification: Plant Literate! (Although I seem to be always a month behind, and have no time for individual posts, so it will most likely happen in bursts. Ah, well. Better something than nothing, is my current motto.) This is a doubly-sweet endeavor because what I've been learning these past months has been focused on the growing ...

Friends, Today is the last day of school for my students, and although I'll continue through the end of the week with my colleagues in workshops and other wrap-up activities, summer has arrived. It's been another wonderful year, but I can't think of one solitary person who doesn't love these two words put together: summer break. Summer break! Oh, for a few months in which to go where the wind blows me, do what the whims insist! Perhaps I'll show up here a bit more? Or perhaps I'll disappear still deeper into this marsh that is my back yard, what with its wildflowers and ferns and maples and oaks and ash and cottonwood and beech and tamarack stands. I am rippling with contentment. Can you tell? Like the leaves. Like the air, blue and redolent, and so very very close.  Books:   The Progress of Love by Alice Munro -- The entire collection is wonderful, but "Miles City, Montana" struck at my heart with a force. The Small Backs of Children  by...

Yesterday, on our drive home, my son asked to stop at the local elementary school playground. It was a beautiful afternoon, and I was antsy from grading final essays inside all day, so I willingly brought us there. For the first few minutes, I followed him protectively as he circled through slides and ladders and bridges, dodging the older and sharper movements of the kids also there playing as a part of the after-school program. Eventually, though, I told Elliot I was going to rest on a bench nearby, and not thirty seconds later, I observed him introducing himself to an older boy sitting in the shade underneath the slide, playing with an assortment of small objects. "Hi," I heard my son say. "Can I play with you?" I couldn't overhear how the other one replied, and because of the age difference--I would learn later he was in second grade, easily four or five years older than my son--I felt myself again on guard, wondering if El would be able to read a social c...