海角大神

Today鈥檚 stories explore presidential messaging, efforts to shelter California鈥檚 homeless residents, a bold climate proposal, a movement in limbo, and a Monitor film critic鈥檚 picks for escapist flicks. But first, a tale of a new connection made in isolation.

When Billy Collins read the Monitor鈥檚 story about New York shut-in Carmella Parry and Poems on Wheels, he says he was stirred by her joy-filled enthusiasm for the poems she received with her delivered meals.

The former U.S. poet laureate sent Ms. Parry a copy of his book 鈥淭he Rain in Portugal.鈥� 鈥淚 just thought a book of poems might be a nice surprise for Carmella,鈥� Mr. Collins told the Monitor鈥檚 Harry Bruinius, who wrote about Ms. Parry.聽鈥淚 mean, the entire city is locked down.聽That image that we have of the elderly living in apartments in New York, and just the kind of loneliness of so many of them 鈥� she鈥檚 kind of had her own locked down, shelter-in-place life, a shelter within this larger viral shelter now.鈥澛�

Ms. Parry, at 94, has lived in the same fourth-floor walk-up for 70 years. Her sisters live nearby but are also homebound. They talk every day by phone, and Ms. Parry sends them cards with lines she composes.

Mr. Collins聽included a note wishing her the best. 鈥淪he鈥檚 become kind of a paradigm of what鈥檚 happening to a lot of us that are confined now.鈥�

He notes how Wordsworth once hoped personal lives would be marked by 鈥渓ittle, nameless, unremembered acts of kindness and of love.鈥澛�

鈥淭he 鈥榰nremembered鈥� ingredient is the key,鈥� says the author of 鈥�.鈥� 鈥淭he idea is to forget your good deeds, and that is done when your kind acts come so naturally you don鈥檛 remember them.鈥�

A quick note before moving onto today鈥檚 stories: Be sure to check out Laurent Belsie鈥檚 story from yesterday on the newly unemployed. The story has been updated to reflect the latest unemployment figures released today.