Thursday, March 13, 2014


Oh, this week has been quite perfect.  Blue skies every day, - warm sun and that lovely spring energy that urges you to be outside; tempts you into the garden even before the breakfast dishes are done!!!

I have been raking leaves, cutting down last year's dry flower stalks and poking around where
the earth is soft, looking for precocious pale green stubs, rich red folds of awakening peonies, and baby daggers amid last year's beds of iris.

Marvelous to have been released from gingerly treading on slippery ice to a springy step on dry ground!!

A wonderful drive on Sunday, over the Richter Pass and into the south Okanagan, 
looping up through Oliver and Okanagan Falls and then back on the
highway to the Similkameen.

All the baby calves and the beautiful naples yellow of the grasses, tinged with the emerging greens
of spring.  A sharp shinned hawk sits in the sun, with vigilant eye....



Too early, I know, but I imagined that aura of green that surrounds the poplar trees
before they burst into leaf!  And the gold of the willows as the sap rises!!


I have been very remiss in visiting in blogland, but the temptation to be outside 
has been overwhelming......

Tonight, as I came to the computer after a busy day outside, I found this
poem from Wendell Berry's  'Timbered Choir: The Sabbath Poems'

No, no, there is no going back.
Less and less you are
that possibility you were.
More and more you have become
those lives and deaths
that have belonged to you.
You have become a sort of grave
continuing much that was
and is no more in time, beloved
then, now and always.
And so you have become a sort of tree
standing over the grave.
Now, more than ever you can be
generous toward each day
that comes young, to disappear
forever, and yet remain
unaging in the mind
Every day you have less reason
not to give yourself away.

It seemed to describe so well and poignantly the space I now occupy.

4 comments:

The Weaver of Grass said...

I love that photograph of cattle in the valley. Also I love that Wendell Berry poem Hildred and shall read it at my next poetry meeting.

Sallie (FullTime-Life) said...

Oh beautiful early spring! Golden and warm looking... and how beautifully you described the feeling when you first get to spend the days outside. Talked to our Oregon daughter yesterday when she returned my call after spending the whole day outside and heard her describe much the same feelings! I told her and tell you I remember those wonderful days. And miss them.

Barb said...

I can feel you smiling as the grass greens and the trees begin to bud. The poem is wonderful - both words and cadence. Happy spring to you - I hope it has come to stay.

Indrani said...

Lovely scenic view and after winters this is indeed welcome sight.
The poem is a great read.