The geese are back!

Today's posting will be brief. This morning we got our second shot of COVID-19 vaccine. Despite being only slightly sup-par so far, we want to report that on our drive to and from Minneapolis, we saw several small flocks of Canada geese along the mostly open water of the Sunrise River main channel just north and south of County Road 36 in Wyoming. We also saw a flock of 5 geese in the air as we headed toward the cities and, on the way home, noticed several small flocks of small ducks, species unidentified, mixed with the geese. The early scouts of the waterfowl world think it's Spring. Still no sightings of sandhill cranes, robins or red-winged blackbirds to report.

the geese are back!

Photo by J. Harrington

Over the weekend we hope to put aside the irrational exuberance we experienced due to the excessively warm weather over the past week or so. We're grateful most of the snow has melted and that last night's tornadoes weren't really close and the heavy snowfall stayed further North, where it belongs. Unfortunately, our dog SiSi was once again deeply troubled by the nearby thunder and lightening. We keep hoping she'll outgrow it and she keeps reverting to puppyhood whenever there's a thunderstorm in the area. Despite that, effective this afternoon, we're going to accentuate the positive, eliminate the negative, and not mess with Mr. Inbetween.

Spring Snow

By Linda Gregerson

A kind of counter- 

blossoming, diversionary, 

doomed, and like 

the needle with its drop 

of blood a little 

too transparently in 

love with doom, takes 

issue with the season: Not 

(the serviceberry bright 

with explanation) not 

(the redbud unspooling 

its silks) I know I've read 

the book but not (the lilac, 

the larch) quite yet, I still 

have one more card to 

play. Behold 

a six-hour wonder: six 

new inches bedecking the 

railing, the bench, the top 

of the circular table like 

a risen cake. The saplings 

made (who little thought 

what beauty weighs) to bow 

before their elders. 

The moment bears more 

than the usual signs of its own 

demise, but isn't that 

the bravery? Built 

on nothing but the self- 

same knots of air 

and ice. Already 

the lip of it riddled 

with flaws, a sort 

of vascular lesion that 

betokens—what? betokens 

the gathering return 

to elementals. (She 

was frightened 

for a minute, who had 

planned to be so calm.) 

A dripline scoring 

the edge of the walk. 

The cotton batting blown 

against the screen begun 

to pill and molt. (Who 

clothed them out of 

mercy in the skins 

of beasts.) And even 

as the last of the 

lightness continues 

to fall, the seepage 

underneath has gained 

momentum. (So that 

there must have been a 

death before 

the death we call the 

first or what became 

of them, the ones 

whose skins were taken.) 

Now the more- 

of-casting-backward-than-of- 

forward part, which must 

have happened while I wasn't 

looking or was looking 

at the skinning knives. I think 

I'll call this mercy too.

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