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Book of Days

BOOK OF DAYS: A POET AND NATURALIST TRIES TO FIND POETRY IN EVERY DAY

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Filtering by Tag: pussy willow

7 April 2023 (new meds)

Kristen Lindquist

I just want to express gratitude to those readers/friends who reached out to me this week to make sure I was ok. I did post a few haiku that were bleak in tone, but I hasten to assure you that all is well and those poems (including this one) are not representative of my personal reality! But I was really touched that some people in my life read my haiku closely enough to be worried about me and reach out—thank you very much for caring.

***

new meds . . .

fog-wet pussy willows

embrace a power line

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tags haiku, pussy willow, health

February 10: Pussy Willow

Kristen Lindquist

A friend told me recently that when he first moved to Maine, to the boonies of Montville, his 80-year old neighbor told him that every winter she just counted down the days till February 10. Why that date? he wondered. Because, she told him, that's when we start to feel the heat of the sun again here in Maine.

We certainly felt the heat of the sun today, with 45-degree temperatures and clear skies. Up on Beech Hill, where the trail was enjoying a brief mud season, I even came across a pussy willow with two catkins (which was a challenge to photograph in a strong wind).


Hard to imagine that we haven't really turned the corner into spring, that it's going to snow several inches tomorrow and be icy cold on Sunday. But, hey, it's February 10. When the sun does come back out, we'll feel its heat again, more pussy willows will bud, then leaf out. And soon the warmth will be here to stay, for a few months at least.

Catkins in the snow--
even the willow knows when 
earth tilts toward the sun.


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tags haiku, pussy willow, spring, weather, winter

March 5: Signs of Spring?

Kristen Lindquist

This time of year has its dismal moments--cold rain falling on ten-foot high piles of dirty snow, mountain shrouded in mist, foghorn lowing, everything looking rather bleak and blah. Perhaps that's why any little sign that spring is on its way seems so exciting. Last week my husband and I were unduly thrilled to see a turkey vulture soaring over I-95 in New Hampshire, the earliest we've ever seen a vulture in our neck of the woods. This morning while at the YMCA, I noticed out the window, against the backdrop of the town transfer station, budding pussy willows.

View-blocking mounds of snow still fill our yard, however. And on our way back home from the Y we observed a small flock of Bohemian waxwings--a boreal bird we only see here in winter--feeding in an apple tree. But then when we pulled into our driveway, we were greeted by a cacophony of singing birds: a pair of cardinals, goldfinches, house finches, titmice, chickadees... The days lengthen and they respond, regardless of the snow-encrusted landscape.

Above heaps of snow,
pussy willows waken me
from winter's long dream.
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tags birds, haiku, pussy willow, spring, waxwing, winter