Mother Nature’s April Fools joke

This morning I had some personal business and so traveled south to the vicinity of I-94 at 694 and 494 on the eastern edge of the Twin Cities. I was surprised to see (small) numbers of ducks and geese on the still frozen over ponds near the highway. There are no such numbers in our area, 35 or 40 miles north. It looks to as as though the spring migration has stalled out until some waters open up. My current guess is that that won’t happen for at least a week or so.

Canada geese on ice

Photo by J. Harrington

The latest forecast notes we could get up to six inches of snow tonight. Unfortunately, that may well be not just an early April Fool’s joke. It wouldn’t be as demoralizing if we had already enjoyed a few days of warm temperatures and bare ground. Not this year!

whitetail feeding in March's field

Photo by J. Harrington

Almost every day this week a handful of so of whitetail deer have been feeding on something that’s showing up as the snow melts away from the wood’s edge. The forecast snow, if we get it, will recover whatever they’re feeding on and they don’t get to head for an alternative supermarket. That’s one of several reasons I hope the forecast turns out to be overly pessimistic. We’ll let you know tomorrow how this turns out. We promise to avoid April Fools pranks, although we may have to break down and agree with Thomas Stearns [T.S.] about April’s dubious qualities, even though it will be National Poetry Month.

The Waste Land

By T. S. Eliot

‘Nam Sibyllam quidem Cumis ego ipse oculis meis vidi in ampulla pendere, et cum illi pueri dicerent: Σίβυλλα τί θέλεις; respondebat illa: άποθανεîν θέλω.’

     For Ezra Pound
       il miglior fabbro.

              I. The Burial of the Dead

April is the cruellest month, breeding

Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing

Memory and desire, stirring

Dull roots with spring rain.

Winter kept us warm, covering

Earth in forgetful snow, feeding

A little life with dried tubers.

Summer surprised us, coming over the Starnbergersee

With a shower of rain; we stopped in the colonnade,

And went on in sunlight, into the Hofgarten,

And drank coffee, and talked for an hour.

Bin gar keine Russin, stamm’ aus Litauen, echt deutsch.

And when we were children, staying at the archduke’s,

My cousin’s, he took me out on a sled,

And I was frightened. He said, Marie,

Marie, hold on tight. And down we went.

In the mountains, there you feel free.

I read, much of the night, and go south in the winter.

What are the roots that clutch, what branches grow

Out of this stony rubbish? Son of man,

You cannot say, or guess, for you know only

A heap of broken images, where the sun beats,

And the dead tree gives no shelter, the cricket no relief,

And the dry stone no sound of water. Only

There is shadow under this red rock,

(Come in under the shadow of this red rock),

And I will show you something different from either

Your shadow at morning striding behind you

Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you;

I will show you fear in a handful of dust.

                      Frisch weht der Wind

                      Der Heimat zu

                      Mein Irisch Kind,

                      Wo weilest du?

‘You gave me hyacinths first a year ago;

‘They called me the hyacinth girl.’

—Yet when we came back, late, from the Hyacinth garden,

Your arms full, and your hair wet, I could not

Speak, and my eyes failed, I was neither

Living nor dead, and I knew nothing,

Looking into the heart of light, the silence.

Oed’ und leer das Meer.

Madame Sosostris, famous clairvoyante,

Had a bad cold, nevertheless

Is known to be the wisest woman in Europe,

With a wicked pack of cards. Here, said she,

Is your card, the drowned Phoenician Sailor,

(Those are pearls that were his eyes. Look!)

Here is Belladonna, the Lady of the Rocks,

The lady of situations.

Here is the man with three staves, and here the Wheel,

And here is the one-eyed merchant, and this card,

Which is blank, is something he carries on his back,

Which I am forbidden to see. I do not find

The Hanged Man. Fear death by water.

I see crowds of people, walking round in a ring.

Thank you. If you see dear Mrs. Equitone,

Tell her I bring the horoscope myself:

One must be so careful these days.

Unreal City,

Under the brown fog of a winter dawn,

A crowd flowed over London Bridge, so many,

I had not thought death had undone so many.

Sighs, short and infrequent, were exhaled,

And each man fixed his eyes before his feet.

Flowed up the hill and down King William Street,

To where Saint Mary Woolnoth kept the hours

With a dead sound on the final stroke of nine.

There I saw one I knew, and stopped him, crying: 'Stetson!

‘You who were with me in the ships at Mylae!

‘That corpse you planted last year in your garden,

‘Has it begun to sprout? Will it bloom this year?

‘Or has the sudden frost disturbed its bed?

‘Oh keep the Dog far hence, that’s friend to men,

‘Or with his nails he’ll dig it up again!

‘You! hypocrite lecteur!—mon semblable,—mon frère!”

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The music of Spring

Will the temperatures stay warm enough locally that we’ll get all rain; mostly rain with some snow; rain, snow, and freezing rain; and how many inches of snow tomorrow night? That is the question making us more pensive than usual over the next thirty-six to forty-eight hours. When all is said and done, come Palm Sunday, April 2, will we have gained (bare) ground or lost to increased snow cover? Will the roads become icy or not? The answer, as with so many things these days, is “It depends.” 

In our part of the North Country, April is the month we experience Winter into Spring. George Winston has a wonderful album by that title. If you’re tired of a winter that won’t remove her bony, ice-cold fingers from our throats, follow the link above. Then listen. Do it even if you’re not fed up with winter. It’s beautiful music and I believe we all need more beauty in our lives. In fact, I believe we’d all be better off if entrepreneurs put as much  effort and as many resources into increasing the beauty in the world as they do into growing Artificial Intelligence. Then again, I doubt there’s such a thing as Artificial Beauty, right?

Canada geese calling: Spring music

Photo by J. Harrington

Even for those of us who have grown increasingly impatient with winter’s leave taking lasting even longer than Minnesotans saying good-by at the end of an evening visit, there’s a beauty in the inevitability of longer days eventually becoming warmer days which will arrive in a foreseeable future.

After I’ve posted today’s blog musings, I think I’ll dig out and play a Beatles’ song that’s also appropriate for this time of year, although I admit I am partial to the Richie Havens’ version of Here Comes the Sun. And then I think I’ll follow that with Simon and Garfunkle’s April Come She Will. This music should help me ignore the snow that’s just started falling outside and is expected to continue for several hours. Maybe it will even help me repress the screams I feel building inside.

Spring Storm

William Carlos Williams - 1883-1963

The sky has given over 
its bitterness. 
Out of the dark change 
all day long 
rain falls and falls 
as if it would never end. 
Still the snow keeps 
its hold on the ground. 
But water, water 
from a thousand runnels! 
It collects swiftly, 
dappled with black 
cuts a way for itself 
through green ice in the gutters. 
Drop after drop it falls 
from the withered grass-stems 
of the overhanging embankment.

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Taking poetic license with time

It’s almost the end of March. Although it’s sunny, the outside temperature is about half of the normal high for this time of year, after one of the top ten snowiest winters on record around here. Next month, April, is National Poetry Month, so I want to disregard what’s left of March and start April early [although I reserve the right to return to March if things improve in the next day or two].

Here’s a look at this year’s poetry month poster, which  you can request for free at the preceding link:

2023 National Poetry Month poster

I find this year’s poster to be a delight. Last year’s was nice although the year before's was not to my taste. The caption in this year's poster is from Ada Limon’s poem The Carrying, found below. I may reread my copy of her most recent volume, The Hurting Kind, “An astonishing collection about interconnectedness—between the human and nonhuman, ancestors and ourselves—.” It fits with several other books on interconnectedness I’m reading [such as The  Systems View of Life] and is less heavy than the Czeslaw Milosz volume I’m currently part way through.

After four year’s of tRUMP, three years of COVID, and the current socio-economic turmoil, I’m grasping for insights to help make sense of what increasingly looks like a crazy world. Much of poetry “...we were all meant for something”  helps me adjust and adapt. The question of what it is we were meant for gets raised by other poems and poets and makes me wonder if I [we] really should adjust and adapt. After you’ve read today’s poem, ask yourself “What’s the purpose of a deer, a mayfly, a dandelion?” Then think about what we are meant for.

The Carrying

Ada Limón - 1976-

The sky’s white with November’s teeth,
and the air is ash and woodsmoke.
A flush of color from the dying tree,
a cargo train speeding through, and there,
that’s me, standing in the wintering
grass watching the dog suffer the cold
leaves. I’m not large from this distance,
just a fence post, a hedge of holly.
Wider still, beyond the rumble of overpass,
mares look for what’s left of green
in the pasture, a few weanlings kick
out, and theirs is the same sky, white
like a calm flag of surrender pulled taut.
A few farms over, there’s our mare,
her belly barrel-round with foal, or idea
of foal. It’s Kentucky, late fall, and any
mare worth her salt is carrying the next
potential stake’s winner. Ours, her coat
thicker with the season’s muck, leans against
the black fence and this image is heavy
within me. How my own body, empty,
clean of secrets, knows how to carry her,
knows we were all meant for something.

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Are we sure this is “Spring?"

With the possible exception of questioning if we’ll enjoy enough snow cover for a white Christmas, the arrival of real spring stresses what little patience I have more than any other seasonal change. I don’t recall every getting antsy about when the leaf color will appear in autumn, but I do begin to wonder about when we’ll get leaf-out (usually around early May). Once the ice is off local trout streams, I wear insulated waders until water temperatures climb enough to make light-weight waders or wet wading comfortable. No big deal. I don’t even get too concerned about ice out on our local lakes and, since I’m not really an ice angler, I never care about when the ice will be thick enough to walk on.

some “Springs" mid-April looks like this

Photo by J. Harrington

Now, if you’re feeling brave, ask me how much I want the ice off our driveway and the snow gone from our yard. I’ll give you an earful. It’s possible, now that I’m learning about no mow May and leaving dead leaves in place until we start mowing, rather than “tidying” the yard as soon as the soil dries and grass turns green, I’lll have to repress old habits and urges but it will be worth it to be able to get out and walk around with the dogs without having to break trail.

I suspect that growing up on the Atlantic coast, literally within ten miles or so of the ocean, has me biased against the kinds of winters we get in the North Country. I became imprinted on winters that were neither as long nor as deep as those we get here. The fact that we may get a couple of inches of snow this week and another inch and a half next week and, in between, may see our first 50℉ high since some time months ago doesn’t help. It feels as if Mother Nature keeps teasing us with a promise of spring only to snatch it away and say “Not yet!!” That kind of inconsistency is maddening, in both (all?) senses of the word.

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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A time of promises (to be fulfilled)

By the time this week has ended, March will have turned into April and we’ll be celebrating(?) April Fool’s Day. Barring the bizarre, snow will still cover the ground albeit at a lesser depth. Next week, next month, spring begins to get serious, but first we need to get there.

I’m anticipating enjoying the gradual appearance of spring ephemerals. Soon spring’s songbird migrants, such as Baltimore Orioles and Scarlet Tanagers will arrive, some to stay, others to pass through. I’m disappointed, but not surprised, that we’ve not seen big flocks of waterfowl yet. The local ponds and lakes are still covered with snow and ice (as is about 75% of our driveway).

when will wood ducks return?

Photo by J. Harrington

The sun is now warm enough that, sitting in an easy chair in the sun-filled living room, I get warm and sleepy. That’s an improvement over winter’s chilliness in the same chair when the skies were gray and the wind howling. A few days back, we shared Wallace Stevens’ Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird, in which he ponders:

V

I do not know which to prefer,   

The beauty of inflections   

Or the beauty of innuendoes,   

The blackbird whistling   

Or just after.   

Today I’m feeling much the same about spring’s arrival. I do not know which to prefer, the enjoyment of anticipation or the arrival of the season's harbingers. Snow remains in the forecast, but is outnumbered by days of warmth and/or rain. Soon all our precipitation will be rain, at least for a few weeks or months. We’ve progressed to a point that the consecutive days of 1 inch snow cover at the airport is down to a trace after 116 days. We’re almost there in the real world as well as on the calendar.

Spring Song

Dorothy Parker - 1893-1967

(In the Expected Manner)

Enter April, laughingly,
     Blossoms in her tumbled hair,
High of heart, and fancy-free—
     When was maiden half so fair?
Bright her eyes with easy tears,
     Wanton-sweet, her smiles for men. 
“Winter’s gone,” she cries, “and here’s Spring again.”

When we loved, ‘twas April, too;
     Madcap April—urged us on.
Just as she did, so did you—
     Sighed, and smiled, and then were gone.
How she plied her pretty arts,
     How she laughed and sparkled then!
April, make love in our hearts
     Spring again!

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Earth awakens

There is now open water in the Sunrise river at County Road 19, east of Stacy. The pools a couple of miles to the south are still completely ice covered, or they were this morning. Spring is arriving on a slow train this year.

The Better Half noticed and called to my attention that at least some trees are taking on the first faint blush of spring color, accompanied by a very slight  softening of their winter outlines. The pond north of our property has again attained open streaks of water but is still about three-quarters ice-covered. It looks about the same as it did last year at this time.

local pond today and March 22, 2022

Photo by J. Harrington

We’re enjoying enough signs of early spring that whatever I pass off as patience has disappeared. I want the snow and ice GONE NOW! That and five dollars will get me a decent cappuccino someplace.

Reports are that some local bears have left hibernation and are snacking at local bird feeders. I’ve started bringing ours in at night. With the amount of snow still covering the ground, there can’t be many other options for bruins to break their winter fasting.

An Earth Song 

Langston Hughes - 1901-1967

It's an earth song,—
And I've been waiting long for an earth song. 
It's a spring song,—
And I've been waiting long for a spring song. 
    Strong as the shoots of a new plant 
    Strong as the bursting of new buds
    Strong as the coming of the first child from its mother's womb. 
It's an earth song, 
A body song, 
A spring song, 
I have been waiting long for this spring song. 

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Water is life!

There’s a “wet spot” at the foot of the slope in the yard behind the house. Most springs it looks something like the picture below. Notice there’s still snow cover but there’s also an obvious pool of water. So far this year there’s no sign of a pool developing. I think it has something to do with the extended drought Minnesota has been experiencing up until this winter.

backyard wet spot in late March

Photo by J. Harrington

The pool appears to be groundwater-based. I think the lack of surface water is because the groundwater had dropped a lot and not been replenished when winter set in. This morning the mud and puddles at the east end of the driveway were gone. Evaporation and/or seeping into the soil probably accounts for most of the disappearance. What little was left froze overnight. Midday today the mud and puddles are back. I’m not a hydrologist but I am suspicious that we won’t see our wet spot until the groundwater has been replenished in our neighborhood. Remember the old song about "Dem Bones" (also called "Dry Bones" and "Dem Dry Bones”)?

Verse 1
Toe bone connected to the foot bone
Foot bone connected to the heel bone
Heel bone connected to the ankle bone
Ankle bone connected to the leg bone
Leg bone connected to the knee bone
Knee bone connected to the thigh bone
Thigh bone connected to the hip bone
Hip bone connected to the back bone
Back bone connected to the shoulder bone
Shoulder bone connected to the neck bone
Neck bone connected to the head bone
Hear the word of the Lord.

The hydrologic cycle works pretty much that way except where we’ve made a mess of it. Atmospheric water falls as rain or snow, runs off or sinks in and what doesn’t re-evaporate flows eventually back into the oceans where the cycle restarts. The pollution we discharge into the air or local rivers gets conveyed to the ocean or precipitates from the atmosphere. Remember acid rain? It’s still falls and is now accompanied by PFAS. Except for sunlight, our Earth is pretty much a closed system. There is no “away.” 

Wind, Water, Stone

By Octavio Paz
Translated by Eliot Weinberger

for Roger Caillois

Water hollows stone,

wind scatters water,

stone stops the wind.

Water, wind, stone.

Wind carves stone,

stone's a cup of water,

water escapes and is wind.

Stone, wind, water.

Wind sings in its whirling,

water murmurs going by,

unmoving stone keeps still.

Wind, water, stone.

Each is another and no other:

crossing and vanishing

through their empty names:

water, stone, wind.

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S’now longer amusing

Melting snow, still frozen ground, other than the top inch or two, brings puddles and mud to the driveway where it intersects the road. I’m resisting an urge to try spreading a dark brown tarp over the ice near the garage to see if that accelerates melting ice at the western end of the drive. Getting the tarp out of the way so we can drive in and out of the garage seems more trouble than it’s worth. Maybe Santa will bring a flame thrower for Christmas or we’ll get the drive blacktopped so we can avoid this hindrance to safe perambulation next spring.

I believe we’re close to entering the top ten records for the longest stretch of consecutive days with at least one inch of snow cover at the Twin Cities airport. It’s no wonder I’m getting so giddy about sunny, warm days melting snow and ice. It’s been a long, snowy, winter, even for the North Country.

how long until budburst?

Photo by J. Harrington

We missed what’s been reported as a spectacular aurora display last night. I’m not sure what the dogs might have made of it and I regret missing it, but almost every time there’s an alert and we watch, we see nothing! I’m not sure if I’d still be an angler if I’d gone fishing 99 times and caught nothing any of those times.

Another sign of spring’s arrival occurred today. I began the cleanup of the dogs’ winter deposits. First I had to dig the scooper out of a snow bank on the south side of the garage. That’s done and we’ll be more likely to enjoy sunny episodes of cleanup along the road as we progress into spring. I mentioned to the Better Half that a great birthday present would be a robotic poopba, like a roomba but for cleaning up after dogs. I’m not sure if such a thing has been invented yet but I bet there’d be a market, especially if it could follow along as folks walked their dogs in places like city parks and trails where prompt pickup is legally mandated.

Near Spring Equinox 

Jeanetta Calhoun Mish

A ruby crocus near the porch sends up
hope—winter of sorrow is waning
the dire moon of almost-spring rises
full with promise of renewal,
shaming twinkling city lights in its splendor. 

I search for my faith, wonder where
I lost it, find it in deep cinnamon
mud smushing up between my toes.
Across a spent field, a lake in shadow
serenades curvature of earth.
As if on cue, a comet streaks
across somber roiling river of sky. 

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Where are the blackbirds?

The picture below was taken on March 13, 2016, seven years ago. March 13, 2023 occurred ten days ago. Admittedly, I’ve not been out and about that much recently, but I’ve not yet seen any red-winged blackbirds this year. Their arrival is something else to look forward to, although their song(?) / call(?) is far from melodious to my ears.

red-winged blackbird returned for Spring

Photo by J. Harrington

Slowly, every so slowly, the ice on the driveway is melting from east, where the blacktopped road is, toward the west, where the garage is. Unfortunately the shadows deepen along the drive as we move toward the west. At the rate we’re going, I may get to give the Better Half a Mother’s Day present of a driveway that’s finally ice-free. Today I bring that up because tomorrow someone I’ve known for a relatively short period of time, and that only virtually, is bringing me two boxes of poetry books that he needs to find a new, caring, home for. I’m planning on backing my Jeep down the drive to the road, so we can do the transfer where his vehicle is much less likely to get stuck and both of us less likely to slip and fall. If he has time for a cup of coffee, I’ll give him a ride up the drive into the garage, where he can disembark onto a damp but relatively ice-free floor. Damn the complications mid-February and March rains, followed by freezing temperatures, impose on North Country living! Then again, two cartons of poetry books that I may not have read is the kind of “problem” I can enjoy “solving.”

I’m truly curious to see which poets and what kinds of poetry will be in the boxes. Will they complement my normal reading patterns or lead me off in new directions? Is my taste in poetry already eclectic enough that there will be nothing jarring? Can people with somewhat similar outlooks on life have significantly disparate collections of poems? Admittedly, a sample of one pair is not statistically significant but it’s likely to be the best I get in this lifetime. No doubt there are at least as many ways of looking at poetry and life as there are of looking at a blackbird.

Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird

By Wallace Stevens

I

Among twenty snowy mountains,   

The only moving thing   

Was the eye of the blackbird.   

II

I was of three minds,   

Like a tree   

In which there are three blackbirds.   

III

The blackbird whirled in the autumn winds.   

It was a small part of the pantomime.   

IV

A man and a woman   

Are one.   

A man and a woman and a blackbird   

Are one.   

V

I do not know which to prefer,   

The beauty of inflections   

Or the beauty of innuendoes,   

The blackbird whistling   

Or just after.   

VI

Icicles filled the long window   

With barbaric glass.   

The shadow of the blackbird   

Crossed it, to and fro.   

The mood   

Traced in the shadow   

An indecipherable cause.   

VII

O thin men of Haddam,   

Why do you imagine golden birds?   

Do you not see how the blackbird   

Walks around the feet   

Of the women about you?   

VIII

I know noble accents   

And lucid, inescapable rhythms;   

But I know, too,   

That the blackbird is involved   

In what I know.   

IX

When the blackbird flew out of sight,   

It marked the edge   

Of one of many circles.   

X

At the sight of blackbirds   

Flying in a green light,   

Even the bawds of euphony   

Would cry out sharply.   

XI

He rode over Connecticut   

In a glass coach.   

Once, a fear pierced him,   

In that he mistook   

The shadow of his equipage   

For blackbirds.   

XII

The river is moving.   

The blackbird must be flying.   

XIII

It was evening all afternoon.   

It was snowing   

And it was going to snow.   

The blackbird sat   

In the cedar-limbs.

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Return of the raptor?

A barred owl (the barred owl?) is on the same branch occupied several days ago by either the same bird or a different one that looks very much  the same. Since, as far as I know, it’s not possible to put ear tags on barred owls, I have real difficulties telling one from another. The one on the perch today doesn’t look quite like the one previously seen, but that could as well be my  eyes or memory. In any  event, we’re more than pleased that the perch is again occupied by a barred owl, right out where we can watch from our easy chair.

today’s barred owl

Photo by J. Harrington

If it’s not the same owl, what are the odds that the one branch on an oak tree is so ideal that two separate owls would choose it? If it is the same owl, where was it yesterday and the day before? Maybe owls are also guided by conditions like “When the moon is in the Seventh House // And Jupiter aligns with Mars” that help them determine where to perch.

I have two books about owls, Intriguing Owls and Twelve Owls. It’s been awhile since I’ve read either. Time to pull them off the shelf and see what they say about barred owls. Seems the least I can do to get to know more about a new neighbor.

The Owl

Edward Thomas - 1878-1917

Downhill I came, hungry, and yet not starved;
       Cold, yet had heat within me that was proof
       Against the North wind; tired, yet so that rest
       Had seemed the sweetest thing under a roof.

Then at the inn I had food, fire, and rest,
       Knowing how hungry, cold, and tired was I.
       All of the night was quite barred out except
       An owl’s cry, a most melancholy cry

Shaken out long and clear upon the hill,
       No merry note, nor cause of merriment,
       But one telling me plain what I escaped
       And others could not, that night, as in I went.

And salted was my food, and my repose,
       Salted and sobered, too, by the bird’s voice
       Speaking for all who lay under the stars,
       Soldiers and poor, unable to rejoice.

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Please be kind to each other while you can.

Welcome, Spring!

On our first full day of Spring, the midday snow showers were mercifully brief and light. Melting commenced by midafternoon. I’m hoping by this time next week it will seem not unreasonable to go exploring for emerging skunk cabbage. The ten day forecast makes it look like we’ll get a slow melt with nightly refreezing, which should help limit flooding concerns. I’m old enough that visits from Santa don’t get me very excited, but the arrival of open water and bare ground after a winter like the one just ended has me gleeful.

emergent skunk cabbage

Photo by J. Harrington

In honor of the arrival of Spring, today I transplanted two shamrock plants from their plastic pots to a more respectable planter. We hope the effort proves successful. Gardening is not one of my strong points. I’m much more of a hunter/fisher/gatherer/forager. As I was removing the plants from their plastic pots, it appeared I’ve overwatered them and they haven’t been getting enough sunlight. The next week will give us an insight into whether the transplant will be accepted or rejected. Meanwhile, I’d like to find some potted crocuses (croci?) to brighten the place.

The pair of wild turkey hens that visit from time to time were back this morning. It would be great if they’d clean up the mess the squirrels and birds have made feeding on the whole, unshelled, sunflower seeds. As I was headed to visit the Granddaughter this morning, I almost ran over a wild turkey jake that decided to dash across the road about 75 yards in front of the Jeep. We tapped the brakes and swerved slightly left as the bird dashed frantically right and everyone went on their way unharmed.

The past few days have brought another sign of Spring’s arrival. Increased numbers of dead oak leaves are falling from the trees, their connections loosened as the buds for this years green leaves begin to swell. We know that Minnesota has experienced snow fall every month but one. I suspect the same may be true about oak leaves, they fall every month but one.

Skunk Cabbage

by Mary Oliver

And now as the iron rinds over
the ponds start dissolving,
you come, dreaming of ferns and flowers
and new leaves unfolding,
upon the brash
turnip-hearted skunk cabbage
slinging its bunches leaves up
through the chilling mud.
You kneel beside it. The smell
is lurid and flows out in the most
unabashed way, attracting
into itself a continual spattering
of protein. Appalling its rough
green caves, and the thought
of the thick root nested below, stubborn
and powerful as instinct!
But these are the woods you love,
where the secret name
of every death is life again - a miracle
wrought surely not of mere turning
but of dense and scalding reenactment. Not
tenderness, not longing, but daring and brawn
pull down the frozen waterfall, the past.
Ferns, leaves, flowers, the last subtle
refinements, elegant and easeful, wait
to rise and flourish.
What blazes the trail is not necessarily pretty. 

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Thanks for visiting. Come again when you can.
Please be kind to each other while you can.

A question of focus and intent

 A little sun; a little clouds; a little warmth; a little spring is what we’re enjoying today. At 4:24 pm we will experience Vernal Equinox and, once again, the meteorological season will coincide with the astronomical one. Spring will have sprung.

As we know, or I hope we do, Spring Is A New Beginning. For my "New Beginning,” henceforward I’m going to train my focus on “news” about which I can do something. I don’t really care about when or how tRUMP gets arrested and convicted, only that it happens. I’m not about to stuff my money in a mattress, so I will but hope and pray that the banking system remains sound, as Treasury Secretary Yellen assures US it is. (Full disclosure: although the staff of the failed bank probably should have followed the Fed staff's guidance, I’ve been in a position in which I truly believed only an idiot would follow the guidance state and federal staff were suggesting for some projects I was helping lead.)

soaring into Spring

Photo by J. Harrington

Anyhow, much as it troubles me to not be a fully informed citizen, the ratio of noise to signal even in a paragon of news virtue such as the Guardian has exceeded my tolerance. Henceforth I will be spending less time checking the news and social media and more time focused on:

• fly-fishing
• rivers
• sourdough
• poetry & storytelling
• Druidry and “the systems view of life”
• matters related to the above and
• writings about any and all of the preceding

I think part of what pushed me over the edge was this article in MinnPost: Why Minnesota lawmakers’ plan to enlist social workers to help Metro Transit woes could be a challenge. We need elected and public officials who are better at connecting dots and solving problems than at protecting their own functional or geographic silos. You don’t need me to rant about what’s wrong with the world and the IPCC is doing a fine job pointing out global malfeasance.

Continued greenhouse gas emissions will lead to increasing global warming, with the best estimate of reaching 1.5°C in the near term in considered scenarios and modelled pathways. Every increment of global warming will intensify multiple and concurrent hazards (high confidence). Deep, rapid, and sustained reductions in greenhouse gas emissions would lead to a discernible slowdown in global warming within around two decades, and also to discernible changes in atmospheric composition within a few years (high confidence).

It is increasingly apparent that the human race will soon be living in a self-created hell-on-earth. Meanwhile, we are being beleaguered by alleged news that’s actually lies and distortions of racist, homophobic, book-banning idiots. I’m not yet ready to start rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic, but I am ready to start a new beginning focused on enjoying what’s left of my life and paying attention to magats only to the extent I can help put a stick in their spokes.

A Song on the End of the World

By Czeslaw Milosz

Translated by Anthony Milosz

On the day the world ends

A bee circles a clover,

A fisherman mends a glimmering net.

Happy porpoises jump in the sea,

By the rainspout young sparrows are playing

And the snake is gold-skinned as it should always be.

         

On the day the world ends

Women walk through the fields under their umbrellas,

A drunkard grows sleepy at the edge of a lawn,

Vegetable peddlers shout in the street

And a yellow-sailed boat comes nearer the island,

The voice of a violin lasts in the air

And leads into a starry night.

And those who expected lightning and thunder

Are disappointed.

And those who expected signs and archangels’ trumps

Do not believe it is happening now.

As long as the sun and the moon are above,

As long as the bumblebee visits a rose,

As long as rosy infants are born

No one believes it is happening now.

Only a white-haired old man, who would be a prophet

Yet is not a prophet, for he’s much too busy,

Repeats while he binds his tomatoes:

There will be no other end of the world,

There will be no other end of the world.

Warsaw, 1944

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Thanks for visiting. Come again when you can.
Please be kind to each other while you can.

As the forces of light prevail

The patches of snow-free ground on the south-facing slope behind the house are once again growing. Although both the Sunrise river and the pond north of the property are once again frozen over, the channels where recently there was open water are obvious and should return soon, perhaps this week. All this is in accord with the arrival tomorrow of this year’s Spring Equinox. Tomorrow, briefly, darkness and light will be in balance and then light will dominate until the Autumnal Equinox when the forces of light slide beneath the dark side.

someday soon, Grasshopper, someday soon

Photo by J. Harrington

Joni Mitchell has captured this, and more, in her beautiful lyrics to the chorus of The Circle Game:

And the seasons they go round and round 
And the painted ponies go up and down 
We're captive on the carousel of time 
We can't return we can only look 
Behind from where we came 
And go round and round and round 
In the circle game

We can’t change the past but each moment of now influences the futures we are co-creating with our fellow inhabitants of Earth. (If our feet were bigger, I’d write our fellow inhobbitants.) Can you tell that incipient Spring has improved my winter-dark mood? In fact, my mood has improved enough that it’s helped me to remember a great piece of advice someone gave me almost four decades ago. A fellow I knew back then told me to “Make it be a good day, whether it wants to or not!” That slipped my mind during the past COVID-sullied years that followed a Trump-sullied period that’s an embarrassment in our country’s history.

The voters have been too susceptible to the forces of darkness and have become unbalanced in their emphasis on individual success at the expense of family, neighborhood, community and country success. Paul Wellstone phrased it wonderfully years ago when he told us that “We all do better when we all do better.” None of us is raised in isolation nor in the woods like Romulus and Remus. For that matter, wolves don’t live in a dog eat dog world. Since this seems to be a day for me to throw around pithy observations, let me close out this last full day of winter 2023’s posting with another one that is relevant to the former orange-skinned, blown-blond-haired occupant of the White House: “No one is totally useless who can at least serve as a bad example.” 

For the Children

by Gary Snyder

The rising hills, the slopes,
of statistics
lie before us,
the steep climb
of everything, going up,
up, as we all
go down.

In the next century
or the one beyond that,
they say,
are valleys, pastures,
we can meet there in peace
if we make it.

To climb these coming crests
one word to you, to
you and your children:

stay together
learn the flowers
go light

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Thanks for visiting. Come again when you can.
Please be kind to each other while you can.

Water is life, right?

Yesterday, beneath a gray, cloud-covered sky, we witnessed a flock of five swans flying toward something, somewhere. The silhouettes of white necks, wings, and bodies, against the pale gray background, was enough to make even an unbelieving observer consider angels. In my mind there is no doubt they are harbingers of Monday’s arrival of the Vernal Equinox. The early arrivals are probably seeking open water on which to rest. Many of us are looking for open water for a variety of reasons.

open water in a week or two?

Photo by J. Harrington

There is a Lakota phrase “Mní wičhóni,” which means “Water is life,” The Ojibwe have a comparable phrase, Nibi gaa-bimaaji’iwemagak“ “Water gives life.”  When water is frozen, life becomes difficult to maintain because water is less readily available. According to a recent report, water will soon be less available for many.

An article in the Guardian today notes:

The world is facing an imminent water crisis, with demand expected to outstrip the supply of fresh water by 40% by the end of this decade, experts have said on the eve of a crucial UN water summit.

Governments must urgently stop subsidising the extraction and overuse of water through misdirected agricultural subsidies, and industries from mining to manufacturing must be made to overhaul their wasteful practices, according to a landmark report on the economics of water.

Since Minnesota is a "water rich" state, some may think we needn't pay attention to yet another world crisis. However, one of the major action items in the report is to “Reduce the more than $700bn of subsidies in agriculture and water each year, which often fuel excessive water consumption, and reduce leakage in water systems.” The states that have been reliant on Colorado River water are already in trouble. California is experiencing either too little or too much water or both. Are our water rights adequate to protect our resources from gluttonous ranchers and farmers?

The political fragmentation we’re experiencing isn’t helping US resolve major issues such as water or other liquidity shortfalls. Why should we tolerate those who would use dissemination of disinformation as a basis foor governance. Is that the patriotic solution, to yield influence to foreign adversaries? Might  that not become our swan song?

The Swan

by Mary Oliver

Did you too see it, drifting, all night, on the black river?
Did you see it in the morning, rising into the silvery air -
An armful of white blossoms,
A perfect commotion of silk and linen as it leaned
into the bondage of its wings; a snowbank, a bank of lilies,
Biting the air with its black beak?
Did you hear it, fluting and whistling
A shrill dark music - like the rain pelting the trees - like a waterfall
Knifing down the black ledges?
And did you see it, finally, just under the clouds -
A white cross Streaming across the sky, its feet
Like black leaves, its wings Like the stretching light of the river?
And did you feel it, in your heart, how it pertained to everything?
And have you too finally figured out what beauty is for?
And have you changed your life?

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Thanks for visiting. Come again when you can.
Please be kind to each other while you can.

On St. Patrick’s Day

 I don’t recall if I’ve mentioned that I am now officially studying Druidry, but this St. Patrick's Day seems a good time to confirm that it's so. I’m looking for a non-exploitive relationship with Earth and want to avoid cultural appropriation concerns that could emerge from trying to follow Native American spiritual paths. I’m “of Irish extraction,” as the saying goes, so Druidry seems to offer a viable option. We’ll see how it goes.

Irish soda bread

Photo by J. Harrington

About a week ago, in anticipation, I baked a loaf of Irish soda bread (from a mix). The two potted oxalis (shamrocks) are still alive on a shelf in the sun. Nevertheless, we can’t properly celebrate this day without sharing an Irish Blessing, so here’s one I’m fond of:

May love and laughter light your days,

and warm your heart and home.

May good and faithful friends be yours,

wherever you may roam.

May peace and plenty bless your world

with joy that long endures.

May all life's passing seasons

bring the best to you and yours!

Now, let's close for today with a Nobel Laureate Irish poet I'm also fond of, and a poem as fitting for our times as Yeat’s Second Coming, but a little more upbeat:

Anything Can Happen

Seamus Heaney - 1939-2013

Anything can happen. You know how Jupiter
Will mostly wait for clouds to gather head
Before he hurls the lightning? Well, just now
He galloped his thunder cart and his horses

Across a clear blue sky. It shook the earth
And the clogged underearth, the River Styx,
The winding streams, the Atlantic shore itself.
Anything can happen, the tallest towers

Be overturned, those in high places daunted,
Those overlooked regarded. Stropped-beak Fortune
Swoops, making the air gasp, tearing the crest off one,
Setting it down bleeding on the next.

Ground gives. The heaven’s weight
Lifts up off Atlas like a kettle-lid.
Capstones shift, nothing resettles right.
Telluric ash and fire-spores boil away.

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Thanks for visiting. Come again when you can.
Please be kind to each other while you can.