Blossoms tease the senses now,

budding as they are into first bloom.

Predicting to the birds they might soon

have places to hide

And to the bees, some work to do.

To we who watch it all unfold,

a promise and a reminder.

One more round begins

and isn’t that the message.

Everything, everything has a rhythm

and---even we--- goes in cycles,

which always, always begins and ends

in this moment, again.

When I see the still-mostly-bare trees silhouetted against the sky, it’s the writer in me who itches to describe the feeling and the feast for the eyes.

But he never quite gets it right.

Saying the branches of one are like a thousand petrified snakes and the Oak like a cluster of broccoli might have come close. But more is always felt needed and in the end a book of words would not truly satisfy or capture what seeing those trees stirred up inside. And yet the writer tries mostly to allow what he observed to repeatedly wash over him, hoping, of course, to find more words, better words, to convey more accurately what was seen and what was felt.

The photographer just wants a capture. I say just, but not in a bad way. The photographer knows he must move quickly and tries not to think too much about what he is after. He responds to the moment knowing full well a change in direction, or the light, can alter and even lose completely, the moment. He’s the one willing to yank the wheel, slam on the brakes, spill the coffee if necessary, and grab the camera to show you the magnificence of those trees. After all, isn’t a picture worth a thousand words?

But if you are both, a writer and photographer, you would think you’ve got it all covered. But not really. You might record a good representative of the actual scene, but how do you describe it? How do you convey how it makes you feel?

The photographer lives in the moment; for the moment. The writer lives in his head. Is one better? No. Both, I think, are trying to burrow down to what cannot ultimately be explained---the Mystery itself AND the need to rub hearts with the rest of creation.

So when I try to tell you that a thousand petrified snakes waved slowly against a buttermilk sky while the sparkle of multi-faceted diamonds from the sun filled my eyes---I may as well just say: i was humbled to tears. And yet….I’ll keep trying. I’m ultimately trying to satisfy myself; reveal my own emotions. I try to do it for you as well, but in the end, you’re on your own. You have the same dilemma. I can only hope I’ve allowed us both another trigger, another way in.

Don Henley once said in one of his songs, “I’d like to find your inner child and kick it’s little ass…” There are days I’d like to invite him over to do just that for me.

I woke up today with that cloud of doubt, that sense of impending doom, that background chatter about this being the day the lake dries up and I run out of creative bullets.

Good thing I had the common sense to stand over here:

“Like a spider I return again and again to the task, fully conscious that the web I am spinning is made of my own substance, that it can never fail me, never run dry….”---Henry Miller

You know what it is about a good poem?

It’s not a good poem until you need it.

But when you need it, it’s there.

And then---well---

It’s the best thing ever written.

And you are persuaded

You’ll never be hungry again.

With the sky dark, like a lover who has pulled the covers tight around the neck for comfort and warmth against the cold, and the clouds pillows of dirty cotton, the gigantic Oak tree across the way gets the privilege of showing off its moss-covered limbs; the green being the brightest thing about the early grey morning.

Magnificent comes to mind as a description, along with the awareness that the moss has to have been there for some time, it being so thick and covering so lavishly all the branches. It’s just, what chance does it have on a sunny day to stand out?

Fortunately the other plant beings don’t have our egos and jealousy genes, otherwise they might feel like old ladies at a church social when the colorfully clad young thing arrives with her emeralds and large-brimmed chapeau on display, showing up the dull, lifeless black and gray frocks they wear, as if always headed for a funeral.

Butterfly Mornings,
Butterfly Mornings,
Butterfly Mornings....
And Wildflower Afternoons....

I don't know that anything else needs to be added to those words. I think if Butterfly Mornings doesn't just instantly flood you with smells and images and feelings and satisfaction and quiet and the delicateness of a breeze, and contentment and rest.....well.....it could be a long afternoon.

When my Dad died last year, we moved our 86 year old, Alzheimer card-carrying Mom to a facility in Cleveland where she could be regulary visited by family. Today, when my brother tried to remind her that Dad had passed, she looked at Fred and said, with an incredulous tone in her voice, as if he was the one who had lost his mind: "Well if my Sweetie is gone....who's that man I've been living with....?