Cows in the snow

" We turn into winter;

when the next spring comes we will melt until

we run like rivers down the high green hill."

from We are sitting on a high green hill

by Gwendolyn MacEwen

Home again cont

“And this is what I learned: that the world’s otherness is antidote to confusion, that standing within this otherness—the beauty and the mystery of the world, out in the fields or deep inside books—can re-dignify the worst-stung heart.”

From Upstream: Selected Essays

by Mary Oliver

I wanted to post some shots from the trip home. The roads were good and there was a lot of hoar frost transforming the landscape. We also saw lots of animals most I did not get photos of. We saw Pronghorns which I mentioned last post. A deer had just crossed the road as we went through. We also saw Snowy Owl, a coyote, partridges and two unusual sights, the first a Red fox amid a cloud of crows. The second a Bald Eagle with Magpies. I thought in both cases they were being mobbed but Helen though they had a been feeding from the same road kill. It was a vey blue and white day.

The combination of moving car and moving animal rarely make for a stellar photo. But I have including it because I was really surprised to see a Bald Eagle here. We were heading towards the tiny badlands town of Dorothy Alberta at the time. I did not realize that this portion of the Red Deer River Valley had Bald Eagles.

Seen on a road trip two

"But the fool on the hill

Sees the sun going down

And the eyes in his head

See the world spinning round"

Beatles

Blue skies smiling at me, nothing but blue skies do I see

"We do know this much:
that it billowed white at the mountainous top
and its flat underside was the grey of headstones;
that it slid onto the land and felt its way
over the contours of several western states, 
always moving eastward, from left to right
the way eyes move over print
as if it were reading the earth with its blind shadow. 

Otherwise, it did nothing
but allow itself to be blown through the high cold 
atmosphere,
though it was always changing shapes
and assumed in its lifetime the form
of Australia, the head of an enormous dog,
a sheep on the run, a hippo with its mouth agape, 
and even the camel that passed through the eye of Hamlet. "

from Biography of a Cloud

by Billy Collins

"Today was the first time in a couple of weeks that the smoke pulled back enough to allow us blue sky. We planted some volunteer spruce that we got from the farm and raided Rigmor's garden for cucumbers, tomatoes, potatoes, carrots and corn. And the harvested hay field suddenly sprouted a neighbours cows takings a walkabout under the blue skies. 

Whatever it is you are struggling to remember,
it is not poised on the tip of your tongue,
not even lurking in some obscure corner of your spleen.

It has floated away down a dark mythological river
whose name begins with an L as far as you can recall,
well on your own way to oblivion where you will join those
who have even forgotten how to swim and how to ride a bicycle.

No wonder you rise in the middle of the night
to look up the date of a famous battle in a book on war. No wonder the moon in the window seems to have drifted out of a love poem that you used to know by heart."

from Forgetfulness 
by Billy Collins

"White faced cattle lowing, sagebrush everywhere

Granite spires are standing all around

I'll tell you folks it's heaven to go ridin' down the trail

Just to watch the desert sun go down"

from Riding Down the Canyon

   as performed by Arlo Guthrie

As always when on the farm I went out to marvel

at the mismatched horns and coat palettes that

constitute Ralph's herd I did notice the Angus Black

seems to be disapperaing. 

Again with a tip of my hat to Roy 

(at roynaturelogbook see my  links )

I have declared a Cow Day.

Dreams of Disarmament

Harry the great polled Charolais

swollen as the sin of pride,

heavy with muscle and vitality

counts his kingdom of one

way out in the far field.

He spares us only one baleful glare

for his thoughts are far away

down to the main corral where

Morely the half-pint Hereford

flashes his horns for an admiring throng.

Guy

Well we just got back fromn a week at the

farm/cabin. ie we stayed at the farm while we built

an outhouse for the cabin. A four days and we

still have some work to do, sigh. But I decided to

 start the chronicle of our adventure with a Cow Day,

something I mentioned previously that I shamelessly

stole from Roy at The Fenlandwalker Countryside Blog.

"The distant hills call to me.
Their rolling waves seduce my heart.
Oh, how I want to graze in their lush valleys.
Oh, how I want to run down their green slopes.
Alas, I cannot.
Damn the electric fence!
Damn the electric fence!"

Distant Hills
By Gary Larson

( Far Side )

Note cows are black and white.

"I Never saw a Purple Cow,

I never hope to see one;

But I can tell you, anyhow,

I's rather see than be one."

                     The Purple Cow

                                Gelett Burgess

A little something for Mother's Day.

And so it begins.

"And blown by all the winds that pass
And wet with all the showers,
She walks among the meadow grass
And eats the meadow flowers. "  

                      The Cow

                                        Robert Louis Stevenson

I have shamelessly borrowed this idea this from Roy

at the Great "The Fenlandwalker Countryside Blog"

and declared a "Cow Day"

These are the crew on the farm in Saskatchewan.

I am Boomerang, I am in charge.

I'm new here, I'm wet behind the ears.

Okay I'm still wet everywhere.

 

I am number twenty-five, who is number one?

Show of Horns

 

Everyone line up for the group photo, then back on the bus.

" Oh calf, I sit and languish, calf,
With somber face, I cannot laugh,
Can I forget thy playful bunts?
Oh calf, calf, that loved me once?"

                                         Elegy to a Calf

Sarah Binks, the Sweet Songstress of Saskatchewan