The first day of spring is one thing, and the first spring day is another. The difference between them is sometimes as great as a month.
~ Henry Van Dyke
(Fisherman’s Luck & Some Other Uncertain Things)
~ spring equinox ~
first spring day
Tag: solar festivals
crisp winter air
It is the life of the crystal, the architect of the flake, the fire of the frost, the soul of the sunbeam. This crisp winter air is full of it.
~ John Burroughs
(Winter Sunshine)
~ winter solstice ~
feeling gratitude
Happy we who can bask in this warm September sun, which illumines all creatures, as well when they rest as when they toil, not without a feeling of gratitude.
~ Henry David Thoreau
(A Week on the Concord & Merrimack Rivers)
fairy grace
First rehearse this song by note,
To each word a warbling note,
Hand in hand with fairy grace,
Will we sing and bless this place.
~ William Shakespeare
(A Midsummer Night’s Dream)
early spring
The flowers of late winter and early spring occupy places in our hearts well out of proportion to their size.
~ Gertrude S. Wister
(Women Know Everything!)
winter solstice
Lift up your countenance! The sun’s growing higher.
The light’s pitching camp on free mountain tops.
That hope you conceived
on the winter solstice
stands like a new day’s dawning
in your eyes
shining forth.
~ Einar Skjæraasen
(Seasons)
an apple drops
Life can be so long, now and then
lasting all of months on end
broken by tall grass,
deep-flowing rivers
and kisses
that last no longer than an apple takes
to drop
in that fleeting second between summer and fall.
~ Terje Johanssen
(The Magic of Fjords)
summer solstice
There came a Day – at Summer’s full –
Entirely for me –
I thought that such – were for the Saints –
Where Resurrections – be –
The Sun – as common – went abroad –
The Flowers – accustomed – blew –
As if no Soul the Solstice passed –
That maketh all things new.
~ Emily Dickinson
(The Poems of Emily Dickinson, #325)
…first day of winter…
It’s winter
The loud-mouthed wind bellows
Up the fjord
The houses shake but stand
braving themselves
against the storm –
Under the sombre sky
glimmer mellow lights.
~ Kjell Sandvik
(Sea & Sky)
Welcome Winter!