there’s a calm over the meadow feeling the warm rays of golden light illuminating the mountain brome
nature creating abundant beauty and with gratitude rising within me start this new day on the bright side
ms
A late arrival to Pineridge Natural Area but just in time to catch the sun cresting the horizon. Followed quickly by a warm golden glow illuminating everything. I sat on the bench to journal but when nature provided this glow on the mountain brome, I had to pull out my camera. Have a great day!
Catbird From one branch to another, or across the path, he dazzles with flight. Since I see him every morning, I have rewarded myself the pleasure of thinking that he knows me. Yet never once has he answered my nod. He seems, in fact, to find in me a kind of humor, I am so vast, uncertain and strange. I am the one who comes and goes, and who knows why. Will I ever understand him? Certainly he will never understand me, or the world I come from. For he will never sing for the kingdom of dollars. For he will never grow pockets in his gray wings.
Mary Oliver
This is the last part of a poem by Mary Oliver called Catbird. I relate to this part of the poem because I have experienced such moments with Goldfinches, Robins, and Chickadees. I especially like where she writes, “Since I see him every morning, I have rewarded myself the pleasure of thinking that he knows me.” Yes, I talk to birds!
It is a cold fall morning with 43 degrees. I saw where Berthoud Pass had an overnight low of 18 degrees, so it’s actually warm here. After yesterday’s winds the cloudless skies are beautiful. This mornings full moon cast shadows across the meadow at the natural area. Now a mocha latte. Have an Awesome day!
“Poetry is a life-cherishing force. For poems are not words, after all, but fires for the cold, ropes let down to the lost, something as necessary as bread in the pockets of the hungry.”
Mary Oliver
My car said it was 43 degrees at 5:18 this morning. Hearing reports that the aspens are putting up some very nice colors in the higher elevations. Awoke early and spent an hour at the natural area this morning in almost complete darkness and silence. Brought along a book of poetry to provide some warmth. Yet, I was still chilled by the time I arrived at the coffee shop. As the fall season moves on I will adjust more to the colder mornings and not be near as chilled. However, I was grateful for warm socks and a mocha latte!
After rain after many days without rain, it stays cool, private and cleansed, under the trees, and the dampness there, married now to gravity, falls branch to branch, leaf to leaf, down to the ground
where it will disappear–but not, of course, vanish except to our eyes. The roots of the oaks will have their share, and the white threads of the grasses, and the cushion of moss; a few drops, round as pearls, will enter the mole’s tunnel;
and soon so many small stones, buried for a thousand years, will feel themselves being touched.
“May I have the courage today To live the life that I would love, To postpone my dream no longer But do at last what I came here for And waste my heart on fear no more.”
John O’Donohue
This image was taken back in May. There is something about this tree that keeps me coming back to visit. Wonder if it’s the solitude this tree lives plus the courage to live the life it’s called to live. I also wonder how many of us have failed to live the life we would love.
Sixty-seven years, oh Lord, to look at the clouds, the trees in deep, moist summer, daisies and morning glories opening every morning their small, ecstatic faces— Or maybe I should just say how I wish I had a voice like the meadowlark’s, sweet, clear, and reliably slurring all day long from the fencepost, or the long grass where it lives in a tiny but adequate grass hut beside the mullein and the everlasting, the faint-pink roses that have never been improved, but come to bud then open like little soft sighs under the meadowlark’s whistle, its breath-praise, its thrill-song, its anthem, its thanks, its alleluia. Alleluia, oh Lord.
