A matter of perspective

This morning a brightly colored Baltimore oriole male arrived at the grape jelly feeder. We hope he hangs around and isn’t just passing through. And later, we saw our first ruby-throated hummingbird of the year. Now the questions become: will any of the bulbs we planted last autumn grow this season and will we see scarlet tanagers or purple finches this year?

Baltimore oriole male at grape feeder

Photo by J. Harrington

I’m embarrassed to confess we have yet to wet a line this season. Of course, until recently, snow melt has affected the trout streams we would have been fishing. The current plan is to get licenses this Wednesday and hope that action doesn’t trigger a spring blizzard. Then I get to curse myself for never getting around to having finished cleaning and organizing my fly-fishing gear last winter. Oh well, there’s always the theory that the best way to get gear organized is to use it.😉

The Better Half [BH] likes to actually fish on a fishing outing whereas I also enjoy getting out and just poking around. I suspect that means some solo scouting trips for me in the days ahead while BH is watching the Granddaughter. That will probably turn out to be good for all three of us, especially if I remember to spray permethrin on my fishing shirts in anticipation of mosquito season. It seems like only weeks ago that the ground was snow covered and now... oh, wait! It was!

As we drove past a recently plowed farm field this morning, we noticed half a dozen or so swans and a couple of Canada geese. Rarely do I think about how large swans really are, but seeing  them next to the  geese provided an often lacking scale. Swans are BIG!

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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