Crow in Calgary

"Go on, wild voice; the world's in need of singing

A sort of dead of winter holds the heart.

The climate's changed." 

from Upon a Bird Singing on Parliament Hill

by James Wreford

Finding Beauty

Finding Beauty

" Our kinship with Earth must be maintained; otherwise, we will find ourselves 
trapped in the center of our own paved-over souls with no way out."

                                                       Terry Tempest Williams
                                                               Finding Beauty in a Broken World

I would never disagree.
I understand the world needs another weedy lot covered with satellite dishes,
signs extolling all you can eat lobster and 24-hour hamburgers. I know our cities
are sheltering atolls in the wilderness busily excreting their coral rings of big box 
stores, car lots, and airport hotels to welcome the weary traveller. And I know this 
is both proper and inevitable, who am I to stand in the way of the organic growth 
of the inorganic.

But when you have the asphalt ready for the next mini-mall. let me know so I can 
descend into the excavation past the condoms, cable lines and storm sewer 
pipes. There I will lie down among the grooves left over when the last glacier 
peeled clean the world. And let me take with me the unneeded, the unwanted, 
the dispossessed fox, the back porch skunk, fast food gulls and the crow with 
the broken beak. Cover us with the hot mess and let the world wake us
when you're done.

Guy

“Much is missed if we have eyes only for the bright colors. 

Nature should be viewed without distinction… She makes no choice 

herself; everything that happens has equal significance. 

Nothing can be dispensed with. This is a common mistake 

that many people make: They think that half of nature 

can be destroyed — the uncomfortable half 

— while still retaining the acceptable and the pleasing side.”

 – Eliot Porter

We left the cabin last week, fall was just entering the stage

but plans for travel meant, that this year at least, we could

not stay for the change. Now that we have a wood stove,

we may give it a try next year. When I think of the seasons

I always, eventually think of Edwin Way Teale.

"We would see a thousand moods and facets of the season, 

We would see new birds, new lands, all in the surroundings

of fall."

from Autumn Across America

"There came news of a word.
Crow saw it killing men. He ate well.
He saw it bulldozing
Whole cities to rubble. Again he ate well.
He saw its excreta poisoning seas.
He became watchful.
He saw its breath burning whole lands
To dusty char.
He flew clear and peered."

from A Disaster

Ted Hughes

book Crow

Yes more BC vacation photos. One of the first creatures that

welcomed us on our initial somewhat damp walk on the

seawall were the crows. They were everywhere in the surf, on

the beach, in the park, in the sky. After watching them mob

the Bald Eagles, quarrel with the gulls  and raid the trash cans.

I decided this will be my "totem" animal, go figure I have always

felt a certain affinity for crows whether they were acting as the

noisy heralds of spring or moving through our neighbourhood

in great silent flocks in the fall, they have exerted a strong pull on

my imagination.  Possibly if I lived by a winter roost I would

feel differentely but I don't so I won't.

A great book about Crows is Crow Planet by Lynda Lynn Haupt.

Her book about Darwin, Pilgrim on the Great Bird Continent is

also very good.

And  like a good poem or painting the more closely

you look at a crow the more beauty you find.

And as with all good totems he can be scary looking,

magisterial,

and he also points the way.

"But Crow . . Crow
Crow nailed them together,
Nailing Heaven and earth together -

So man cried, but with God's voice.
And God bled, but with man's blood.

Then heaven and earth creaked at the joint
Which became gangrenous and stank -
A horror beyond redemption.

The agony did not diminish.

Man could not be man nor God God.

The agony

Grew.

Crow

Grinned

Crying: 'This is my Creation,'

Flying the black flag of himself. "

from Crow Blacker than ever

Ted Hughes

book Crow

My wife and I have been out of town for two weeks.

The first week we visited my family in Ontario

the second week we went to Washington DC

where she had a symposium. We mostly went

to art galleries so I do not have a lot of nature

shots from the trip but I will be posting some

photos in the next couple of weeks. In the

meantime here are some shots from the

area behind my office taken just before I left.

University Research Park

09-27 and 09-28

"Crow turned the words into a reservoir, collecting the water.
The water turned into an earthquake, swallowing the reservoir.

The earthquake turned into a hare and leaped for the hill
Having eaten Crow's words.

Crow gazed after the bounding hare
Speechless with admiration. "

                                                                                       Crow Goes Hunting
                                                                                                  Ted Hughes

"As I was walking all alane,
I heard twa corbies makin a mane;
The tane unto the ither say,
"Whar sall we gang and dine the-day?"

"In ahint yon auld fail dyke,
I wot there lies a new slain knight;
And nane do ken that he lies there,
But his hawk, his hound an his lady fair."

"His hound is tae the huntin gane,
His hawk tae fetch the wild-fowl hame,
His lady's tain anither mate,
So we may mak oor dinner swate."

"Ye'll sit on his white hause-bane,
And I'll pike oot his bonny blue een;
Wi ae lock o his gowden hair
We'll theek oor nest whan it grows bare."

"Mony a one for him makes mane,
But nane sall ken whar he is gane;
Oer his white banes, whan they are bare,
The wind sall blaw for evermair"

The Twa Corbies
Scottish Ballad

Monday was a nice day, mostly without rain.

But it has taken me a long time to get to my photos.

On a trip to the pond at lunch I found that

the Mallard ducklings were out and about.

People were of course feeding them bread.

The American Widgeon pair were still around

they have also learned to eat bread.

Sharing it with others is still a work in progress.

My wife and I decided on supper at the

University of Calgary. For some reason the

university has developed a tilt.

Once there we meet the usual suspects.

The young white-Tailed Jackrabbits appeared

about two weeks ago once they were big

enough that the magpies would leave them alone.

My wife pointed out this flicker which has decided

that a drainage pipe makes a great home.

   

"Let us be much with Nature; not as they
That labour without seeing, that employ
Her unloved forces, blindly without joy;
Nor those whose hands and crude delights obey
The old brute passion to hunt down and slay;
But rather as children of one common birth,
Discerning in each natural fruit of earth
Kinship and bond with this diviner clay.
Let us be with her wholly at all hours,
With the fond lover's zest, who is content
If his ear hears, and if his eye but sees;
So shall we grow like her in mould and bent,
Our bodies stately as her blessèd trees,
Our thoughts as sweet and sumptuous as her flowers."

On the Companionship with Nature

Archibald Lampman

I AM STILL HAVING TROUBLE COMMENTING

ON MOST BLOGS INCLUDING MINE.     

I noticed this the other day. It started with

a pair of crow in a tree being circled  by a

third. this went on for a minute or two finally

the two crows moved so they were sitting

side by side while the third continued to

circle closer

This seems to excite a magpie who appears.

hops up the truck and then finally launches

itself at the crows. Eventually everyone leaves.

"What if
the mockingbird came into the house with you and
became your advisor?"

                              How Would You Live Then

                                              Mary Oliver

I continued to take pictures of the frost

at lunch and before going home Friday.

Everything was still quite beautiful.

But for some reason all of nature seemed

to be giving me the fish eye.

"The frost lights glitter on every twig and brier

Till we set intruding feet on the jewelled floor

And shatter the cranberry bushes' frozen fire."

Frozen Fire

Floris Clark McLaren

When I first started taking photos I wondered a bit about

spending so much time looking at the world through a lens. 

But the longer I used it the more I realized I was seeing either,

a world I had forgotten to stop and look at or a world

I could not process well enough with my naked eye

to actually see. So I thought that would be the theme

of this post.

I have posted this photo before but I love it.

After days of freezing temperatures and cloudy skies we had a

cold but clear blue sky. I saw two crows in the distance

but could not make out anything else. At home I saw one crow

was upside down. The sheer joy and exuberance was clear to see.

I can not believe this serves any purpose but celebration.

If we had wings wouldn't we do the same?

I am not sure what the chickadee is up to,

a friend suggested showing off. However

I know I would only see a blur without

the camera and I love the little spray of snow,

the sense of forward motion.

And for some reason the sight of water droplets flying

is always a big hit with me.

 

And there is the beauty in small seemly insignificant things.

                                           "We have been here so short a time

       and we pretend we have invented memory"

                               To The Insects

                           Elders

                                             

                                                    W.S. Merwin

        "There are from time to time mornings, both in summer
and in winter, when especially the world seems to
begin anew, beyond which memory need not go,
for not behind them is yesterday and our past life:"

                                            Journal January 26, 1853

                                                         Henry David Thoreau



We had lots of blue sky today and one thing led to another.

Then they got silly.

" We need to witness our own limits transgressed, and some life

pasturing freely where we never wander."

                             Walden  

                                                           Henry David Thoreau