We're enjoying a Spring rain the day before Easter. During this morning's trip to Marine on St. Croix, we detoured through a drive along the road to the launch area in William O'Brien state park. No sign of wildflowers, but we noted a number of patches that the Better Half claims are wild asparagus and I think are horsetails. I'll go back some time over the next few days and take some photos and we'll watch as the stems develop over the season. Look for updates in future postings, although the emphasis will be on identification, not foraging since "picking wild plants," other than fruits and mushrooms, is against the rules in state parks.
St. Croix Chocolates, Halloween 2015
Photo by J. Harrington
Our trip to Marine ended at St. Croix Chocolates where the Better Half stood in a line that circled the interior and spilled out onto the patio/deck. (From what she overheard standing in line, the crowd wasn't triggered by this morning's coverage of the business on KARE.) Thankfully, the rain stayed sprinkles while we were there. I stayed in my vehicle trying to get my iPhone and the entertainment/information center to play together more nicely. The outcome was unsatisfactory, but the Easter chocolates were worth the trip and the wait. Next year we'll get there earlier during Holy Week and, hopefully, avoid the crowd, since by then I should know how to make the phone and the vehicle talk to each other and to me in a language I understand and will have little to amuse myself with as the Better Half does the heavyliftingwaiting.
Last Supper
I seem to have come to the end of something, but don’t know what, Full moon blood orange just over the top of the redbud tree. Maundy Thursday tomorrow, then Good Friday, then Easter in full drag, Dogwood blossoms like little crosses All down the street, lilies and jonquils bowing their mitred heads. Perhaps it’s a sentimentality about such fey things, But I don’t think so. One knows There is no end to the other world, no matter where it is. In the event, a reliquary evening for sure, The bones in their tiny boxes, rosettes under glass. Or maybe it’s just the way the snow fell a couple of days ago, So white on the white snowdrops. As our fathers were bold to tell us, it’s either eat or be eaten. Spring in its starched bib, Winter’s cutlery in its hands. Cold grace. Slice and fork.
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Thanks for visiting. Come again when you can.
Please be kind to each other while you can.
Terrific poem, new to me, thanks.
ReplyDeleteForsythia in bloom on south side of house (Roseville). (A Korean cultivar developed by U of MN.) Not native, but darn pretty.
Cardinals building nest in white cedar near kitchen window, so this poem.
Peace & Happy Easter
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The Cardinals
The ways of the wild are queer
by human standards
but long ago the Hebraic Old Testament
God gave warning when he said
My ways are not your ways
implying
the storm that rages
out of human understanding
implying time beyond time
space beyond space
stars beyond stars,
I create evil, he said
and make the good, that too,
in proportion
Here on my window ledge
two cardinals
male and female
having lived alone all winter
in that silence of the solitary
who seek their own food
and depend on no one
suddenly exchange seeds
in an ancient ritual
welcoming spring
They are not too intimate
the horn of the beak preventing
they are very wild
but grave and dignified
at this moment
So much so
that if I could
with the proper manners
I should like to give
a seed to you.
Loren Eisley
from his book --Notes of an Alchemist--