“Just as a lamp waved in darkness creates a

figure of light in the air, which remains for as long

as the lamp repeats its motion exactly,

so the universe retains its shape

by repetition: the universe is Time's body.”

from Little Big

John Crowley

 

After a few days of melting, we began to get

new snow, it got a bit colder as well.

Nothing too bad especially when you

see what other people have dealt with. But

today the young dog wanted to bounce in the

belly deep snow and the old dog wanted to be

carried home. The birds have disappeared, huddled

together in some winter bush and are ignoring the

feeders. I did see as gull go by yesterday it must

be confused.

 

I took these pictures Friday. I always think of

these snowy days as a day for the little worlds

within worlds, I find it hard to photograph on a while

canvas so the details become everything, as I enter

the tiny worlds of nature. My camera does not allow

me to enter the mysterious worlds  of Fitz James O'Brien's

The Diamond Lens, Cummings' the Girl in the Golden

Atom, or two favorites, Crowley's Little Big or

James Blaylock's The Land of Dreams but there

are lots of details to sink into even at this scale.

 

 

“The further in you go, the bigger it gets.”

from Little Big

John Crowley

 

 

“What you learn as you get older is that

the world is old, and has been old for a long time.”

from Little Big

John Crowley

 

 

“The things that make us happy make us wise. ” 

 

from Little Big

John Crowley

 

“Their laughter rose to the ceiling and

shook hands there.” 

 

from Little Big

John Crowley

"No one can tell me,

 Nobody knows,

Where the wind comes from,

Where the wind goes."

from

Wind on the Hill

      A.A. Milne

"She cleared the garden of its weeds

And planted several thousand seeds.

Small creatures picked the flowers at dawn

And danced with them about the lawn.

Until they all, down to the least,

Where eaten by a monstrous beast."

                              From The Eleventh Episode

                                            by Raddory Gewe

                                                   ( Edward Gorey )

Small Worlds

  "The Seasons revolve and the years change
With no assistance or supervision."

Another Spring

                        Kenneth Rexroth

 

" If I moved, Basho's frog

Would splash in the pool.

Empty Mirror

                    Kenneth Rexroth

"As long as we are lost

In the world of purpose

We are not free."

Empty Mirror

                     Kenneth Rexroth

The trip to the farm, a nine hour drive offered

ample signs of Spring each pothole, dugout or

slough boasted a complement of Green Winged Teal,

Shovellers, Pintails, Scaups, Mallards, Coots, Grebes,

Buffleheads and countless others.

Flocks of gulls claimed the roads.

At the cabin flocks of Sandhill Cranes,

and a flock of Snowgeese with the black shadows

of Cormorants for contrast flew by.

At the farm mixed flocks of Sparrows claimed the lawn

and a trip to the hardware store was rewarded by the

sight of a Fox trotting along the road and the black shape

of  a Fisher (?) slipping thru a fence.

Signs of Spring

A lash of light; across a brown stage.

The trees begin: their green dance.

                                           Guy

"Last night the geese came back,
slanting fast
from the blossom of the rising moon down
to the black pond. A muskrat
swimming in the twilight saw them and hurried

to the secret lodges to tell everyone
spring had come."

  Two Kinds of Deliverance

                            Mary Oliver

"Where is nirvana?

Nirvana is here, nine times out of ten."

                                Spring-Watching Pavilion

                                  Ho Xuan Huong

A Harvestman on a Schneezwerg rose.

It looks to be missing a leg.

to paraphrase the Bugs of Alberta by John Acorn & Ian Sheldon

  

"There is a legend that if your cow goes missing you

pull the leg off a Harvestman and throw it on the

ground, it will point in the direction the cow went."

They also note there are eight species of

Harvestman in Alberta.

"Delight in the small,

those that inhabit

only a corner of the mind,

the ones shaped by wind

and a season: a slip of

grass, the nameless flower

that offers its scent

to a small wind."

                           Delight in the small, the silent

                             Lorna Crozier

This summer in Saskatchewan and Alberta I saw more

dragonflies and damselflies than ever before.

Boreal Bluet Damselfly

" I see the sky

Smile on the meanest spot,

Giving to all that creep or walk or fly

A calm and cordial lot."

                   To the Snipe

                                  John Claire

Friday morning we are at -22 C heading to -24 C

the photos that follow are from Wednesday.

"This day is definitive            frigid

Brittle             cloudless       And we walk

In the streets and out of the city

Wrapped in our shivering selves"

"A sudden end seems poised

In the air          devoid of love

Some confluence of fate

Traces a black line in the snow"

                     both quotes from

                                  The Waste of the World

                                               R A D Ford

It was hovering around zero Tuesday,

Wednesday night we are at -19 C so quite a difference.

And Wednesday we woke to a day of frost.

"When without warning

winter falls upon the self,"

"Else winter reigns throughtout the self

                                      and we become

more barren then the nest

that sways within a winter wind"

                  both quotes from         
                      Winterkill

                                     D.G. Jones

All three of our locations are situated in park like setting.  Edmonton has a large pond with ducks and geese in the summer.  Calgary used to get deer probably sneaking down from Nose Hill Park but I think a spate of construction a few years ago blocked their routes. We still get grey partridges, duck, geese and white tailed jack rabbits.  These pictures however are still from my trip to Edmonton.

"To be inhabited, to be explored

        With the single-minded perseverance

                        Of a blind man whose sight has been restored."

                                          

                                                The Secret Amplitude

                                                             John Koethe