midwinter

“Herding Sheep in a Winter Landscape at Sunset”
by Joseph Farquharson

Nothing there is that does not love the sun. It gives us warmth and life; it melts the bitter snow and ice of winter; it makes plants grow and flowers bloom. It gives us the long summer evenings, when darkness never comes. It saves us from the bitter days of midwinter, when the darkness is broken only for a handful of hours and the sun is cold and distant, like the pale eye of a corpse.
~ Neil Gaiman
(Norse Mythology)

winter in the marsh

2.20.19 ~ marsh observation area
Barn Island Wildlife Management Area
Pawcatuck, Connecticut

Yesterday Janet and I explored Barn Island Wildlife Management Area in Stonington, the “largest primitive coastal area left unspoiled in Connecticut.” It was a cloudy, chilly winter afternoon, with snow flurries starting up just as we were leaving.

Red-breasted Merganser
moss and ice on stone
trees with fluffy moss?
tidal creek
solitary evergreen
one tree with shelf mushrooms
feather
ice falling into ebbing tide
common loon, winter plumage
common loon, winter plumage
ice falling into ebbing tide
spotted wintergreen
great blue heron
great blue heron

here comes the sun

WillardMetcalf.childsunlight
“Child in Sunlight” by Willard Metcalf

Little darling, it’s been a long cold lonely winter 
Little darling, the smiles returning to the faces 
Little darling, I feel that ice is slowly melting 
Here comes the sun, here comes the sun 
And I say it’s all right 
~ George Harrison
♫ (Here Comes the Sun) ♫ 

Welcome Spring!

when the cold comes

photo by Alyssa Bausch
owl by Alyssa Bausch

When the cold comes to New England it arrives in sheets of sleet and ice. In December, the wind wraps itself around bare trees and twists in between husbands and wives asleep in their beds. It shakes the shingles from the roofs and sifts through cracks in the plaster. The only green things left are the holly bushes and the old boxwood hedges in the village, and these are often painted white with snow. Chipmunks and weasels come to nest in basements and barns; owls find their way into attics. At night, the dark is blue and bluer still, as sapphire of night.
~ Alice Hoffman
(Here on Earth)