W. S. Merwin, Poen and Conservationist, September 30, 1927-March 16, 2019

We lost another poet, W.S Merwin, Friday. 

I think it is safe to say he was a favourite of mine. 

I hope he has passed through the gate 

and found his friends waiting there.

For the Anniversary of My Death

W.S. Merwin

Every year without knowing it I have passed the day   

When the last fires will wave to me

And the silence will set out

Tireless traveler

Like the beam of a lightless star

Then I will no longer

Find myself in life as in a strange garment

Surprised at the earth

And the love of one woman

And the shamelessness of men

As today writing after three days of rain

Hearing the wren sing and the falling cease

And bowing not knowing to what

"I turned

uphill to come to the top gate and the last barn 

the sun still in the day and my shadow going on 

out into the upland and I saw they were milking 

it was that hour and it seemed all my friends were there 

we greeted each other and we walked back out to the gate 

talking and saw the last light and our shadows gesturing 

far out along the ridge until the darkness gathered them 

and we went on standing here believing there were other words 

we stood here talking about our lives in the autumn. " 

                                      From his poem Gate

A lovely discussion of the poem Gate can be found here at The Globe and Mail's,  How Poems Work;

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/how-poems-work/article4129599/

Links to tributes can be found here

https://www.staradvertiser.com/2019/03/16/hawaii-news/w-s-merwin-prize-winning-poet-and-ardent-naturalist-dies-in-his-maui-home/

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/15/obituaries/w-s-merwin-dead-poet-laureate.html 

https://www.theparisreview.org/blog/2019/03/15/crashing-w-s-merwins-wedding/

https://www.npr.org/2019/03/15/509122300/poet-w-s-merwin-who-was-inspired-by-conservation-dies-at-91

https://theamericanscholar.org/there-is-no-time-in-the-garden/#.XI0yoBNKi9Y

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/collections/144293/remembering-ws-merwin
https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/W-S-Merwin-poet-of-austere-lyricism-who-twice-13692721.php

https://www.vogue.com/article/ws-merwin-obituary?verso=true

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2019/mar/15/ws-merwin-poet-laureate-dies-91

Bobcats in Calgary

My friend Doug sent me the following photos of a bobcat walking on the fence in his backyard yesterday. Click on the photo for a larger version. This is the second time Doug and Karine have seen a bobcat in their yard, but the first time he was able to get such nice photos, from inside the house I might add. Reports of bobcats in Calgary have made the local news more and more over the last few years. I have included a links to a CBC article on Calgary bobcats and and some information from Alberta Environment.  (These photos are reproduced here with permission, further reproduction is prohibited and the rights to the photos remains with Doug.) 

Thanks for sharing these lovely photos Doug.

As followers of my blog know I like to include some poetry with my posts. I have quoted these lines before but they immediately sprung to mind when I though of these photos.

"Cocked in that land tactile as leaves

wild things wait crouched in those valleys

west of your city outside your lives

in the ultimate wind, the whole land's wave. 

Come west and see; touch these leaves." 

from Midwest

by William Stafford

For more on Willian Stafford, probably my favourite poet and the quote below see;

https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/william-e-stafford

" Frederick Garber says of Stafford's first book of poems, West of Your City, "West is both Midwest and far West but it is always west of where we are. It is the place of nature and especially of nature's secrecy, that Otherness which we can touch at times." 

What to do if a bobcat family sets up in your backyard
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/bobcats-calgary-what-to-do-backyard-1.4271192

Government of Alberta
https://www.alberta.ca/bobcats.aspx

The Winter Prairie #10

"Bell rings and they go and the voice draws their pencil

like a sled across snow; when its runners are frozen

rope snaps and the voice then is pulling no burden

but runs like a dog on the winter of paper."

from The Stenographers

by P.K. Page

Anansi, 1974

The Winter Prairie #9 (Vision now fine)

This is when the accomplished Mr. Murple

Splendid on skates comes forth to spin the night

Upon his arms outstretched and whirling eyeballs.

 from Ice at Last

George Johnson

Toronto Oxford University Press 1959

The Winter Prairie #8

"Yes, it has its head in the clouds, clouds
on its mind, indifferently
contemplates the weather by day, 
at night the blue toil of stars, 
reminding us of someone cleaning 
a house or writing a poem"

from Cloud Gate
by Kathleen Wall & Veronica Reminder

University of Calgary Press, 2018

The Winter Prairie #7

"Moving 

to establish distance

between our houses.

It seems

I welcome you in."

from Moving

by Phyllis Webb

Selected Poems 1954-1965

Phyllis Webb, Tallon Books, 1971

The Winter Prairie #6

"With the noise of a thousand typewriters

We shall gallop over the roofs of town.

We are the the Sun's animals.

We stand by him in the West

And ready to obey

His most auburn wish

For Rain, Wind and Storm"

from The Sundogs

by James Reaney

McClelland & Stewart, 1949