You Have a Belonging Here
You Have a Belonging HereThe hermit thrush has a songthat tumbles from his throatlike a spring from the oldest stones,a […]
Why I Make Art
Do you have a birthday tradition? Mine is hiking Big Butt Trail. Last year my husband and I were drenched in a thunderstorm. I was certain I was going to die by lightning strike. On my birthday. This year, however, the weather was fine―overcast and chilly and perfect weather for trilliums, which bloom in absolute profusion in mid-May on this trail. Hence the tradition.
Snowdrops
How do snowdrops do it? How do they know when to bloom? Is it the light, the thawing earth? Or some secret alchemical algorithm known only to the Snowdrop Queen, who conducts the Snowdrop Symphony from her ethereal fairy realm?
Long Light
Long Light pastel on board, 8 x 10″ You are walking westward, into the mountain. It is early January, just
The Grief Hedge, the Beautyway
I want to hate them. The big machines. They are not people, they are not alive, and so it would
Hellebores
This is the second February for my hellebores, which I planted later in the season two years ago, and they are well established and adorned with more blossoms than I put in my pastel. Their old leaves from last summer lay spent upon the ground, still green but dying back, now that new growth is emerging.
The Story the Boulder Told Me
In the mornings I hike the ridge up behind my house. The path follows what I think is an old logging road and climbs steeply up to the top of Open Ridge, where I usually turn around and make my way back down. Theres a spot I’m looking at, paying special attention to, because it’s a boulder with a shelf where bloodroots bloom, and it’s the time of year when they might start blooming. This morning I stopped at that boulder and there were no bloodroots but it felt like there was a story that the boulder had to say. So, this is what I wrote down.
Pale Beauty
In the fading light of dusk a waxing crescent hangs on the horizon. A Pale Beauty moth emerges into her first night, dressed in the ephemeral wings of her ancestors. She is surrounded by paper birch leaves. Like the Moon, she is just emerging, cast with the shimmer of new things. Vibrant and untouched, her wings have not lost one scale.
Hag
I walk along the edge of the river.
It is full from many days’ rain. I’ve been reading the folklore of the hag. There’s Long-Armed Nelly, the hag of rivers, who will grab you and pull you into her wet home. There you would obviously drown, and be eaten by her. It seems a little real as the dark river rolls below me with furious power. I think of branches that might rush by, and pull me into the cold rushing waters. I keep my distance from the edge.