I spent several happy hours yesterday reading some of Milton’s poems, and a bit of his biography. Oddly enough, I read on my laptop from an on-line edition while I was watching a football game. (I wonder if I’m the first person in the history of the universe to combine Paradise Lost with football.) At every commercial I muted the sound on the TV and read a few lines. Somehow, it seemed just right, as though the rhythms and wisdom of the poems somehow complemented the graceful hostility of the game.

Now, as I write at 4:38 a.m., I hear the rain quietly landing outside. It’s a soft, reticent rain, as thought it doesn’t want to disturb anyone on this Monday morning. “I’ll be very quiet,” it seems to say. “I’ll go about my business of meticulously watering your town and then I’ll silently slip away.”