Spring is overflowing

Roadside ditches are full of flowing waters. Low areas in farm fields have become ephemeral ponds. Floodplain wetlands and marshes are flooded. Spring and snowmelt have arrived, accompanied by flock after flock of migrating songbirds and waterfowl.

local creeks flowing more than bankful

Photo by J. Harrington

Several upland fields held a pair or more of sandhill cranes. We can confirm seeing the first robin of the season. The Better Half shared a photo she took of a butterfly. And yet, it was quite disconcerting to drive back roads with the window down in the Jeep, enjoying temperatures over 70℉, while looking at substantial snow cover on many fields, in many wooded areas, and residual snow banks along ditches.

The melting snow in the fields behind the house has revealed a mess made by underground critters during the winter. After the soil has dried, we’ll drag a harrow over the mounds and tunnels that have been turned up. Before we get to that, we’ll collect and burn garden carts full of dropped, broken, branches and finish picking up the winter’s worth of dog droppings. At least those chores will have us outside enjoying sunshine, warmth, and the opportunity to walk on bare, greening ground.

It will be a few more days before the level of mud in the dog run has diminished to the point where we can let our two out for some free play time and be able to safely let them back into the house. Meanwhile, we’re going to figure out what to wear over the next couple of days as high  temperatures creep into the eighties and then drop back into the fifties over the weekend. If anyone has good, tested, suggestions on how to organize a seasonal wardrobe for that kind of pattern, please drop a note in the comments.

April

By Alicia Ostriker

The optimists among us

taking heart because it is spring

skip along

attending their meetings

signing their e-mail petitions

marching with their satiric signs

singing their we shall overcome songs

posting their pungent twitters and blogs

believing in a better world

for no good reason

I envy them

said the old woman

The seasons go round they

go round and around

said the tulip

dancing among her friends

in their brown bed in the sun

in the April breeze

under a maple canopy

that was also dancing

only with greater motions

casting greater shadows

and the grass

hardly stirring

What a concerto

of good stinks said the dog

trotting along Riverside Drive

in the early spring afternoon

sniffing this way and that

how gratifying the cellos of the river

the tubas of the traffic

the trombones

of the leafing elms with the legato

of my rivals’ piss at their feet

and the leftover meat and grease

singing along in all the wastebaskets

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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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It’s finally mud season in our neck of the woods

Based on firsthand experience this morning, I can attest that township gravel roads have become very muddy. I even saw melt water flowing in one of the roadside ditches where, in the not too distant future, I expect to see marsh marigolds.

mud season on gravel roads

Photo by J. Harrington

The kind folks in the Twin Cities and at least one of the local tv stations did a report that made me feel better about the shape of our driveway. Even good-sized cities like Minneapolis and St. Paul are having problems with removing ice and compacted snow and where to put it all after it’s been removed. We’re very close to the stage of “Mother Nature put it there, let her take it away.” 

The pond to our north is displaying hints that it wants to open its water and flow. Our snow-covered roof is not covered as deeply as it was a couple of days ago. Dark spots on the driveway, like leaves that fell last autumn, are absorbing enough heat from the little sun we get to melt the ice on top of them. Winter, like many of us, has grown old and is beginning to fall apart.

To the Thawing Wind

Robert Frost - 1874-1963

Come with rain, O loud Southwester!
Bring the singer, bring the nester;
Give the buried flower a dream;
Make the settled snowbank steam;
Find the brown beneath the white;
But whate’er you do tonight,
Bathe my window, make it flow,
Melt it as the ice will go;
Melt the glass and leave the sticks
Like a hermit’s crucifix;
Burst into my narrow stall;
Swing the picture on the wall;
Run the rattling pages o’er;
Scatter poems on the floor;
Turn the poet out of door.

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What color is March?

Some time this month, this year probably in the second half, we will see a reduction in winter’s white and return of colors to the landscape. Not as spring wildflowers, those come later in the season. The first colors often arrive in the stems, branches and twigs of bushes and seedlings, or in the swelling of leaf buds. They bring a welcome respite from a monotonously monochromatic view dominated by white, the combination of all colors in the visible spectrum.

as color returns in March

Photo by J. Harrington

As the snow melts and the ground unfreezes, sap begins to flow in plants, think maple sugaring. Color begins to return as reds and yellows [see picture above]. Soon, green will become dominant in late spring and summer, just as white was during winter. For now, we get to enjoy a prelude to autumn’s beautiful leaf colors, but lower in the trees. Open water, blue skies and bright sunshine help heighten the beauty of early spring. Replacing snow with more than mud is an aesthetic treat that comes for a brief period each year in country that enjoys more than one season.

Come April and May, our eyes are often cast down to discover spring ephemerals. In March, once we no long have to watch for icy patches underfoot, we can look around and observe life, and color, returning. Soon, very soon, but not quite yet.

Colors passing through us

By Marge Piercy

Purple as tulips in May, mauve

into lush velvet, purple

as the stain blackberries leave

on the lips, on the hands,

the purple of ripe grapes

sunlit and warm as flesh.

Every day I will give you a color,

like a new flower in a bud vase

on your desk. Every day

I will paint you, as women

color each other with henna

on hands and on feet.

Red as henna, as cinnamon,

as coals after the fire is banked,

the cardinal in the feeder,

the roses tumbling on the arbor

their weight bending the wood

the red of the syrup I make from petals.

Orange as the perfumed fruit

hanging their globes on the glossy tree,

orange as pumpkins in the field,

orange as butterflyweed and the monarchs

who come to eat it, orange as my

cat running lithe through the high grass.

Yellow as a goat’s wise and wicked eyes,

yellow as a hill of daffodils,

yellow as dandelions by the highway,

yellow as butter and egg yolks,

yellow as a school bus stopping you,

yellow as a slicker in a downpour.

Here is my bouquet, here is a sing

song of all the things you make

me think of, here is oblique

praise for the height and depth

of you and the width too.

Here is my box of new crayons at your feet.

Green as mint jelly, green

as a frog on a lily pad twanging,

the green of cos lettuce upright

about to bolt into opulent towers,

green as Grand Chartreuse in a clear

glass, green as wine bottles.

Blue as cornflowers, delphiniums,

bachelors’ buttons. Blue as Roquefort,

blue as Saga. Blue as still water.

Blue as the eyes of a Siamese cat.

Blue as shadows on new snow, as a spring

azure sipping from a puddle on the blacktop.

Cobalt as the midnight sky

when day has gone without a trace

and we lie in each other’s arms

eyes shut and fingers open

and all the colors of the world

pass through our bodies like strings of fire.

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It’s almost time to spring ahead!

This month I’m looking forward to:

• the gradual disappearance of snow and ice cover from local fields and streams (and driveways)
• the appearance of open, flowing water in local streams
• the arrival of ducks, geese, swans and sandhill cranes at the Sunrise river marshes in Carlos Avery Wildlife Management Area
• the emergence of skunk cabbage in local wetlands
• the return of at least some migratory song birds
• a shift from mostly cloudy to mostly sunny skies(?)
• baking Irish soda bread in celebration of St. Patrick’s Day
• longer evening’s after March 11
• the arrival of more daylight than dark
• average minimum daily temperatures staying above freezing (maybe not until April 1)
• the start of mud season
• getting out and walking and watching and smelling and listening

by mid- or late March this year?

Photo by J. Harrington

I spent this morning clearing an inch plus of snow from the driveway for the third time in the past five days. It’s time, and past time, for winter to exit, stage left. March brings one of the more significant transitions in our seasons. By month’s end I hope to have seen the end of icicles until next February.

Instructions on Not Giving Up

Ada Limón - 1976-

More than the fuchsia funnels breaking out
of the crabapple tree, more than the neighbor’s
almost obscene display of cherry limbs shoving
their cotton candy-colored blossoms to the slate
sky of Spring rains, it’s the greening of the trees
that really gets to me. When all the shock of white
and taffy, the world’s baubles and trinkets, leave
the pavement strewn with the confetti of aftermath,
the leaves come. Patient, plodding, a green skin
growing over whatever winter did to us, a return
to the strange idea of continuous living despite
the mess of us, the hurt, the empty. Fine then,
I’ll take it, the tree seems to say, a new slick leaf
unfurling like a fist to an open palm, I’ll take it all.

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The promises of April

 April is a month of:

• rain; and
• snow; and
• blue skies; and
• cold; and
• warm;and
• mud; and
• thaw; and
• runoff; and
• open waters; and
• migration; and
• snow; and
• rain; and
• blue skies; and
• rebirth; and
• promise; and
• death of winter; and
• bud burst; and
• hope; and
• Easter; and
• death; and
• rebirth; and
• spring walks; and
• the promise of hope; and
• nestlings; and
• emergence; and
• greening; and
• your turn

green returns in April

Photo by J. Harrington

Apple Blossoms

By Susan Kelly-DeWitt

One evening in winter

when nothing has been enough,

when the days are too short,

the nights too long

and cheerless, the secret

and docile buds of the apple

blossoms begin their quick

ascent to light. Night

after interminable night

the sugars pucker and swell

into green slips, green

silks. And just as you find

yourself at the end

of winter’s long, cold

rope, the blossoms open

like pink thimbles

and that black dollop

of shine called

bumblebee stumbles in.

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Springing into season change (again) #phenology

This week we still have a chance of snow showers on Thursday. That tells me we’re in a transition from third winter to mud season. Mid-week next we can expect a thunderstorm. Could that bring a transition from mud season to actual spring? Maybe, if we’re lucky. “Do you feel lucky, punk?” (As Dirty Harry would ask.)

some years late April looks like this

Photo by J. Harrington

This past winter has been long and dreary enough that I’m almost looking forward to spring cleanup. The dogs are happier when there’s no snow underfoots to complicate doing business [with 4 paws X 2 dogs, underfoot is inadequate]. The pond north of the property is almost all open water and the pools north of County Road 36 are in about the same condition. This afternoon even the sun came out from behind the clouds. Things are improving, at least locally, at least weatherwise. Much of the rest of the world remains in suboptimal condition.

On a brighter front, we can now look and listen for emergent skunk cabbage, mating songs of chorus frogs, budburst and eventual leafout. This morning we noticed a pileated woodpecker on the oak trees east of the red maples in the front yard. Maples which underwent their own budburst in the past day or so. Maybe with my own equivalent of budburst I’ll manage to shake the winter blahs and take on the spring spirits.

Much of the poetry I’ve been reading recently has been written by lesser known poets, or lesser known poems by better known poets. Larry Gavin’s A Fragile Shelter, New and Selected Poems is a fine example of a poet and poems that should be more widely known and read.  Warren Winders’ Wild River, which includes poetry and prose about my old stomping grounds in southeastern Massachusetts, is another. Then, again, I’m fascinated by the startling similarities in the cover photos of Ted Kooser’s well known Local Wonders and Gary Lark’s lesser known Without A Map. Is it a similarity or a distinction between prophets and poets that neither or either is “...not without honor except in his own town, among his relatives and in his own home.”

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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Frog concert time #phenology

Last night the Better Half noticed a chorus of peepers and wood frogs. After she told me about it, I stepped onto the deck and heard Spring's first frogs in Minnesota's East Central North Country. Frog mating "songs" may have been heard earlier elsewhere [the calendar is based on the Driftless Area], but Springsong croaked last night in our neighborhood.

Several years ago we were surprised and delighted to discover a tree frog on the screen porch screens on March 30th. It seemed very early but that year was probably warmer than usual. Today's temperatures are about half of what yesterday's were and the "breezes" are even stronger. Tomorrow, temperature-wise, March will leave like a lion (cub) with highs just barely above freezing. Then it's an April Fool's joke with more cold and Spring finally returns by week's end. We are truly looking forward to the kind of weather that's actually a pleasure to be out in. Maybe the end of windchill season will settle for April 1st this year. That'd be nice and we bet the frogs would enjoy not getting covered by skim ice each night, too.

March 30: tree frog on screen

Photo by J. Harrington

Frog. Little Eden.

By Wendy Battin

Amphibious, at home

on the surface

tension, in

over my head, not

out of my depth, not deep

deep deep,

not in far. Not

high and dry, not

even in treetops,

where I sing water

into the root-hairs.

It seeks me, will not

forsake me.

Hand over hand it climbs.

It breaks

the first law of water,

all for my song.

Into the trunk and up, it greens

the leaves that the leaves may be

-emerald me.

The leaves breathe it out and I drink,

then sing

lest the water forget to rise

and the world be kindling.

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for Sythia, we hope

Yesterday there was a large puddle in the driveway. Today, the puddle and 99% of the snow and ice covering the drive are gone. We surmise that indicates the frozen ground has thawed to allow percolation. Observable water is beginning to show in the back yard wet spot.

Some of winter's water will evaporate into the atmosphere, to return as clouds and rain; some will flow over the land to become tributaries and rivers; some will flow through the soil as groundwater. Thanks to those waters, soon our gray, dreary days will be transformed into blue skies, scattered white clouds, green leaves and rainbows of wildflowers. But meantime, we must maneuver mad March's muddy messiness.

(forced) forsythia in bloom

Photo by J. Harrington

We know it's way too early to anticipate blooms on our lilac and forsythia bushes, but we also know that local floral shops often have forced blooms for sale about this time of year. We're going to keep our eyes open, and maybe even go exploring, for a spray of forsythia in bloom. Until the promise of Spring is honored, we need all the help we can get to remember what it was once like. It's been a long four seasons since Spring 2020.

Mud Season

By Tess Taylor

We unstave the winter’s tangle.

Sad tomatoes, sullen sky.

 

We unplay the summer’s blight.

Rotted on the vine, black fruit

 

swings free of the strings that bound it.

In the compost, ghost melon; in the fields(,)

 

grotesque extruded peppers.

We prod half-thawed mucky things.

 

In the sky, starlings eddying.

Tomorrow, snow again, old silence.

 

Today, the creaking icy puller.

Last night I woke

 

to wild unfrozen prattle.

Rain on the roof— a foreign liquid tongue.

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Does winter's nadir equal spring's cusp?

The local snowmobile trails along the roads and in the ditches are showing more and longer patches of mud. Is their season coming to an end for the year? In a little more than a week, ice houses will have to be off Minnesota lakes in the southern two-thirds of the state. Last year's (2020) fishing licenses expire on February 28. Turkey hunting licenses go on sale March 1. All these are signs that winter will soon become spring, but here in the North Country that trip is often made with a stutter step that sometimes seems to take us "back" into winter for a few days.

purple martin house in Spring snowstorm

Photo by J. Harrington

March 1 a couple of years ago looked like the picture above. That's a martin house (sans martins) with all the snow on the roof. We've probably several weeks to a month (or more) to go until we enter this year's mud season. That's not been the same ever since the  township paved our gravel road a few years ago. We still have very mixed feelings about that little element of "progress."

Somewhere along the way it's become a bit of a tradition to get the Better Half a new fishing license as a birthday present. We'll have a chat with her soon and see if it's possible to pencil in a trip sometime early next month. We'll not announce when because that's all too often an invitation to the snow gods to deliver a blizzard and we certainly can do without such, especially as we try to shake ourselves loose from winter's accumulated crust and cruft.

Why Is the Color of Snow?

Brenda Shaughnessy - 1970-

Let's ask a poet with no way of knowing.
Someone who can give us an answer,
another duplicity to help double the world.

What kind of poetry is all question, anyway?
Each question leads to an iceburn,
a snownova, a single bed spinning in space.

Poet, Decide! I am lonely with questions.
What is snow? What isn't?
Do you see how it is for me.

Melt yourself to make yourself more clear
for the next observer.
I could barely see you anyway.

A blizzard I understand better,
the secrets of many revealed as one,
becoming another on my only head.

It's true that snow takes on gold from sunset
and red from rearlights. But that's occasional.
What is constant is white,

or is that only sight, a reflection of eyewhites
and light? Because snow reflects only itself,
self upon self upon self,

is a blanket used for smothering, for sleeping.
For not seeing the naked, flawed body.
Concealing it from the lover curious, ever curious!

Who won't stop looking.
White for privacy.
Millions of privacies to bless us with snow.

Don't we melt it?
Aren't we human dark with sugar hot to melt it?
Anyway, the question—

if a dream is a construction then what
is not a construction? If a bank of snow
is an obstruction, then what is not a bank of snow?

A winter vault of valuable crystals
convertible for use only by a zen
sun laughing at us.

Oh Materialists! Thinking matter matters.
If we dream of snow, of banks and blankets
to keep our treasure safe forever,

what world is made, that made us that we keep
making and making to replace the dreaming at last.
To stop the terrible dreaming.

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It's mud season! #phenology

a gravel road early in mud season

Photo by J. Harrington

One week from today is March 1, the first day of meteorological Spring. Today the temperature is in the mid-40's, the sky is blue and the sun is shining. That combination leads to melting snow turning into rills and rivulets which, on gravel roads and unpaved shoulders makes mud and puddles. I don't doubt that we'll see more snow this season and, perhaps, well into astronomical Spring. But we know it won't last, at least that's what we hope. I'll try to not spoil it all by becoming too optimistic.

some leaf buds balloon in early Spring

Photo by J. Harrington

In two weeks Daylight Savings will return, bringing with it longer evenings and later sunrises. I've yet to settle on the details for planting a Three Sisters garden, so that needs to move near the top of the list. There's a couple of branches on one of our oaks that  catch the roll over protection on the tractor each time I mow under the tree. If I'm going to trim them I need to do it in the next week or so to minimize the chances of exposing the trees to oak wilt. Can you tell I'm getting excited about spending time outside? A poet that I probably don't read often enough has a wonderful poem about this time of year. Here's e.e. cummings on Spring:

[in Just-]

By E. E. Cummings

in Just- 

spring          when the world is mud- 

luscious the little 

lame balloonman 

whistles          far          and wee 

and eddieandbill come 

running from marbles and 

piracies and it's 

spring 

when the world is puddle-wonderful 

the queer 

old balloonman whistles 

far          and             wee 

and bettyandisbel come dancing 

from hop-scotch and jump-rope and 

it's 

spring 

and 

         the 

                  goat-footed 

balloonMan          whistles 

far 

and 

wee

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A thaw arrives in the North Country

No one that we've come across ever claimed that the arrival of Spring in the North Country was neat and tidy. This is the week we enter mud and flood season, or is it flood and mud season? The latter is the logical sequence, the former usually occurs chronologically. Pardon us if we seem a little giddy today. Each and every day for the next week or more is now supposed to warm above freezing! Tomorrow, Wednesday and Thursday include rain in the forecast. Experiencing mild snow blindness while walking dogs will soon be but a memory until next Winter. Whereas today, as we collected the bird feeders from the front of the house so we could refill them, we waded through snow drifts that reached over the tops of our Steger mukluks. Yuck! We doubt we'll get enough melting and thawing to make it safe to torch the brush pile as a Vernal Equinox celebration. The hose will probably still be frozen, but we should be in fine shape for Beltane at the start of May.

black chokeberries ripening by the dog run

Photo by J. Harrington

Soon we'll be back to removing buckthorn and, in some places, planting native shrubs in an effort to limit buckthorn's return. Sort of a permaculture approach to invasive species management. We may even check in with the folks undertaking the "Cover It Up" project to see if they have any insight on how long buckthorns' soil-poisoning continues after it's been removed. We want to plant, or transplant, some black chokeberry (Aronia melanocarpa) in some locations behind the house. Then, this morning, we came across a reference to planting hazel as an understory shrub. That could be a nice option for the mixed deciduous woods in front of the house. Maybe, if the rabbits and deer have more options, they'll forego the decorative bushes like roses that they've been munching on this Winter.

decorative in Summer, nutritious in Winter?

Photo by J. Harrington

Time now to start watching for the arrival of geese, cranes, open water and skunk cabbage, not necessarily in that order. Yay!

To One Coming North

By Claude McKay

At first you'll joy to see the playful snow, 

  Like white moths trembling on the tropic air, 

Or waters of the hills that softly flow 

  Gracefully falling down a shining stair.

And when the fields and streets are covered white 

  And the wind-worried void is chilly, raw, 

Or underneath a spell of heat and light 

  The cheerless frozen spots begin to thaw,

Like me you'll long for home, where birds' glad song 

  Means flowering lanes and leas and spaces dry, 

And tender thoughts and feelings fine and strong, 

  Beneath a vivid silver-flecked blue sky.

But oh! more than the changeless southern isles, 

  When Spring has shed upon the earth her charm, 

You'll love the Northland wreathed in golden smiles 

  By the miraculous sun turned glad and warm.

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In Just -- Mud Season #phenology

Sometimes, during a January thaw, we get a little melting on our township gravel road. Yesterday, and again today, and probably for at least the first half of next month (March) we'll be enjoying lots of melting on and in our road. The plows don't consistently clear snowfalls down to the roads surface, so there's compacted snow cover over large stretches of road. Our entire driveway is in the same condition. However, there are large patches and stretches where the plows edge did reach the road's surface. As the sun reaches higher and the rays get warmer and longer, the dirt absorbs warmth and melts the snow pack edges. No such progression occurs in the driveway.

a mudluscious road

Photo by J. Harrington

When we walked the dogs yesterday and today, we left human and canine tracks in the softened, wet, muddy road surface. If the township board can convince the residents at the annual meeting, gravel roads may become a thing of the past, at least in our township. Although we won't miss the Summer's dust, Spring's mud season has been part of our lives for about a quarter of a century now. It is, literally, a rite of (seasonal) passage, that goes with the Northern migration of juncos (we saw a large flock in the wood lot this morning) and the return of song birds. If we didn't get to enjoy it, we'd miss it, just as we miss the little lame balloon man of our childhood.

We've seen reports that sandhill cranes have started their Spring migration and look forward to reporting local sightings in two or three weeks. If we dodge Spring blizzards, by then there may be enough open ground for cranes to forage. If not, they'll no doubt stage South of us until the melt and the mud are back. March madness, melting, mud and migrations! It's that time of year again.

                     [in Just-]

By E. E. Cummings

in Just-

spring          when the world is mud-

luscious the little

lame balloonman

whistles          far          and wee

and eddieandbill come

running from marbles and

piracies and it's

spring

when the world is puddle-wonderful

the queer

old balloonman whistles

far          and             wee

and bettyandisbel come dancing

from hop-scotch and jump-rope and

it's

spring

and

         the

                  goat-footed

balloonMan          whistles

far

and

wee

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It's Valentine's Day! Look for "flowers" soon! #phenology

Happy Valentine's Day!

Photo by J. Harrington

The sun is shining. Temperatures have climbed enough to warm even our black Irish heart. Gravel roadsides are lined with mud and ditches are developing puddles. Not Spring in our North Country, but close to it. Faux Spring perhaps? At least we're closer to the end of Winter than its midpoint. Only two weeks now until the start of meteorological Spring.

British soldier lichen, end of February

Photo by J. Harrington

Although far too early in the season to begin looking for them yet, over the past several years we've found a number of locations where we can enjoy wildflowers such as trillium and trout lilies. It occurred to us today that, if we sketched a map and marked it with wildflower glens or glades or whatever, other than a prairie, one calls a place where native wildflowers grow wild, we might begin to feel more at home in our adopted bioregion. We'll give that some more thought.

skunk cabbage, end of March

Photo by J. Harrington

As we get increasing numbers of above-freezing days, and the snow cover shrinks, we can start looking for early signs of life returning. British soldier lichen have been seen to emerge while there are still patches on snow-covered ground. Since snowdrops aren't wildflowers, we'll look for British soldiers as an early indicator. We think they (the lichen) even show up before skunk cabbage has emerged, but that's something we can try to confirm this season. It obviously didn't take much warmer weather for us to start to get excited about coming attractions. This year we even know where to look locally for prairie smoke, although we're still searching for somewhere that pasque flowers grow.

                     Springtime in the Rockies, Lichen

By Lew Welch

All these years I overlooked them in the

racket of the rest, this

symbiotic splash of plant and fungus feeding

on rock, on sun, a little moisture, air —

tiny acid-factories dissolving

salt from living rocks and

eating them.

Here they are, blooming!

Trail rock, talus and scree, all dusted with it:

rust, ivory, brilliant yellow-green, and

cliffs like murals!

Huge panels streaked and patched, quietly

with shooting-stars and lupine at the base.

Closer, with the glass, a city of cups!

Clumps of mushrooms and where do the

plants begin? Why are they doing this?

In this big sky and all around me peaks &

the melting glaciers, why am I made to

kneel and peer at Tiny?

These are the stamps of the final envelope.

How can the poisons reach them?

In such thin air, how can they care for the

loss of a million breaths?

What, possibly, could make their ground more bare?

Let it all die.

The hushed globe will wait and wait for

what is now so small and slow to

open it again.

As now, indeed, it opens it again, this

scentless velvet,

crumbler-of-the-rocks,

this Lichen!

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Ashes to ashes, snow to mud

Tomorrow is Valentine's Day. It's also Ash Wednesday. The last time that happened was in 1945. The two dates also overlapped in 1923 and 1934 and will coincide again in 2024 and 2029, according to the UK Express. This timing sequence helps explain why I don't remember it ever happening before.

Valentine's Day, Ash Wednesday--is your heart in it?

Photo by J. Harrington

Since tomorrow is Ash Wednesday, today must be Shrove, or Fat Tuesday (Mardi Gras). Although we haven't been particularly religious for years. this year we're seriously considering "giving up" Twitter, or politics, or both, for Lent, as a form of self-denial. In addition, we think for the next six or so weeks, we'll focus on the Spirituality of Fly Fishing and Poetry as a Spiritual Practice. Instead of just foregoing anything as a form of penance, we'll take a positive stance toward substituting spiritual growth for political grumblings. Maybe we'll even make time to finally read Pope Francis' encyclical LAUDATO SI’, on Care for Our Common Home.

For some time now we've been fussing and fuming about our perceived need for the Democrats to offer more than a "at least we're not as bad as the Republicans" strategy. We'd like to see a much more positive approach take the place of opposing the stupid, evil proposals and actions emanating from the GOP controlled White House and Congress. IN the interest of following Ghandi's advice to "be the change you want to see in the world," at least for this Lenten season we will be more positive about what we do want and how we think we might be able to get it. Based on our experience to date, that will require a certain amount of spiritual growth across the board. Wo knows, we may even experience the miracle of a return of warmth by the time Easter has arrived on April 1. For now, we'll leave that alone.

       Draw Near

        By Scott Cairns 

              προσέλθετε

For near is where you’ll meet what you have wandered

far to find. And near is where you’ll very likely see

how far the near obtains. In the dark katholikon

the lighted candles lent their gold to give the eye

a more than common sense of what lay flickering

just beyond the ken, and lent the mind a likely

swoon just shy of apprehension. It was then

that time’s neat artifice fell in and made for us

a figure for when time would slip free altogether.

I have no sense of what this means to you, so little

sense of what to make of it myself, save one lit glimpse

of how we live and move, a more expansive sense in Whom.

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