February 17: Mob Scene, Part Two

A tree full of crows caught my eye this morning. While driving through Rockport on Route One, I noticed a big bunch of crows--technically, a murder of crows--scattered through the roadside woods. So I could see what all the fuss was about without causing an accident, I quickly and prudently pulled over for a closer look. I was able to walk a short way off the road into the trees, where I soon realized that there were more crows than I had originally thought. As best as I could count, 40 or more crows had gathered in this one little area, some flying from tree to tree, some "barking," as crows do, others just hunkered down on a branch waiting for something to happen. None of them seemed frantic or alarmed. A large building blocked my full view of the woods, so short of climbing a tree for a crow's eye view, I can only imagine what they were all up to. All I know is that crows are always up to something. Which is why I love observing their comings and goings in my back yard and around my office. Well, that, and the fact that some days they are the only birds I see.

Owl courtship season has begun. These crows were not far from Merryspring Nature Park, where barred owls are often seen. So perhaps a few crows had found a hapless sleeping owl, sounded the alarm, and now they were all hanging out waiting to see who was going to make the first move. Or maybe they'd already harangued the owl enough to make it fly away, and now they were just rehashing yet one more cool victory over an evil raptor. Only the crows knew what was going on there, and they weren't telling in a language I could understand. O to fathom the mysteries of another species!

Of course, we can't even fathom the mysteries of our own species. But that's another story altogether.

An owl's daytime dreams
must be full of caws, black wings--
but does it notice?

February 16: Calm Before the Storm

As I look out the window at the crisp cornflower blue sky, sun still shining, it seems hard to imagine that the next couple of days will be punctuated by a new spate of snowfall. Depending on what report you read, we're due to get anywhere from 3 to 8 inches. Other than a sudden flurry of chickadee activity at my bird feeder this morning, I've had no presentiment of bad weather on the way. The few clouds beginning to accumulate in the west seem fluffy and insubstantial as yet. If it weren't for TV or the Internet, the snow flurries that are supposed to begin later this afternoon would be taking me completely by surprise. If I had an outside job that required me to be more in tune with the elements--as a fisherman, for example--I'm sure I'd be noticing signs now that would be tipping me off to the impending storm. But most of us are out of touch with that knowledge these days. Most days my innate weather sense is limited to what I'm actually experiencing first-hand (and, also, if my arthritic thumb aches, it's probably cold outside). So tucked away safely in my office with no travel plans to get anxious about or frantic supermarket crowds to contend with, I can calmly enjoy these final hours of sunshine and blue sky--as well as look forward to soon seeing the winter landscape renewed.

Photo by Shannon Thompson

Placid, perfect sky
gives no hint of coming snow,
gives nothing away.

February 15: Snowshoe Hare

Around here, when we talk about wild rabbits--as in, "I'm going rabbit hunting with my beagles this weekend"--we aren't really talking about true rabbits. The only native Maine rabbit is the Eastern cottontail, which doesn't live this far north in the state. And even in southern Maine its numbers are severely declining. What we do have are snowshoe hares. Hares are not rabbits. Many of the differences are subtle, but basically the hare is larger, with bigger feet and longer legs, and its young are precocial--that is, they're born with fur and open eyes, unlike the more helpless rabbit kits. (Interesting side note: baby hares are called "leverets." Probably less interesting side note: this factoid once helped me pick up a cute Harvard guy at a party way back in my college days; he lived in Leverett House and was impressed that I knew what the word meant.)

The snowshoe hare also possesses the neat trick of growing in a new coat each fall, so that by winter it is all white (except for black ear tips) and can easily camouflage itself in the snow. As the snow starts to melt in spring, the grey fur grows back in patches so that the creature still blends in with the mottled ground cover. The cottontail doesn't do this, though its tail does look exactly like a white ball of cotton.

All that aside, old habits are hard to break. So for the rest of this post, every time I say "rabbit," know that I really mean "snowshoe hare."

Winter morph snowshoe hare. Photo courtesy of US Forest Service.

Rabbit tracks are the first animal track I ever learned. I distinctly remember my father pointing out to me the pattern of their tracks in the snow behind our house: two little indentations from the front feet and then prints of the longer, bigger hind-feet ahead of them in the snow. I was only about four, but I've never forgotten this lesson, in part because we see so many rabbit tracks criss-crossing the woods around here. And droppings, and nibbled young trees. By all accounts, we should see as many or more rabbits than we do deer. Yet I've only seen the occasional rabbit in the woods or dashing across a dirt road in the middle of nowhere.

That's why I was so excited yesterday afternoon to see a rabbit bounding through the woods right across the trail in front of my friend Brian and me on Beech Hill. We had seen plenty of tracks in the snow. One day a few weeks ago we had even heard rabbit-hunting hounds in baying pursuit of their quarry, and a little later, gunshots. Between the two of us we've probably seen close to a hundred bird species on the hill. But neither of us had seen a rabbit there. And this one was almost entirely white, in prime winter pelage. If it hadn't run right in front of us, we'd never have seen it in the snowy woods. So it was a particularly gratifying sighting of this very common but elusive species: the "rabbit" / snowshoe hare.

Startled white rabbit,
the snow keeps all your secrets
except your flight path.

February 14: Love Is in the Air

Today you might well ask, Who is St. Valentine and why has "his" day become a romantic holiday? Valentine's Day, drily described by Wikipedia as: "traditionally a day on which lovers express their love for each other by presenting flowers, offering confectionery, and sending greeting cards," doesn't really seem like a holiday that would receive traditional Christian support. No one seems really sure exactly who Valentine was beyond his being a Roman Christian who may or may not have performed what were then illegal Christian marriages. There's the tenuous connection, I guess. Apparently Geoffrey Chaucer was the first one to reference St. Valentine's Day in English in his poem Parlement of Foules, which I mentioned yesterday. An excellent prose translation of this poem by Gerald NeCastro of the University of Maine footnotes this fact. So perhaps we have Chaucer to thank for the romantic tradition, which later bloomed more fully with the exchange of greeting cards in the Victorian era and has now become an excuse for couples to go out to dinner and buy each other sweets and florid cards with messages made up by a bunch of people in cubicles in Kansas City. (For sweets, I highly recommend Maine-made chocolates by Black Dinah Chocolatiers.)


In his poem, Chaucer defined Valentine's Day as the day when birds choose their mates. The poem itself is an entertaining discourse on love, in which the narrator falls asleep and is taken in a dream to the halls of Venus, where all the birds are gathered around waiting to pair up. You can imagine the noise level and sexual tension. The day's proceedings get off to a bad start when three eagles get into an argument over who gets to choose the comely female eagle perched on Venus's arm. The day drags on as other birds, anxious to find their mates, debate in parliamentary fashion how this decision should be made. The goose thinks the female should only go with a mate she really loves; the dove believes in being true to his mate until he dies, etc. Finally the female eagle asks if she can wait till next year to decide. All that debating apparently gave her a headache. I'm not sure if I would recommend this as a romantic poem to share with your lover today (Pablo Neruda and e.e. cummings, for example, have better love offerings), but it's a fun read--keeping in mind that I was an English major and "fun" might be a relative term.


Chaucer or not, just looking out my window I see signs that love is in the air. Squirrels spiral after each other around trunks, bushy tails waving enticements. The insistent "peter, peter" song of the titmice rings out through the trees. The male downy woodpecker knocks on the old birch tree, an early territorial announcement. And owl courtship season is fully underway--friends report that they've been hearing great horned owls this week in the woods around their house, and others have been seeing barred owls on the move. That restlessness that leads us slowly and agonizingly into spring has begun to stir in the woods as surely as the still-chilly breeze. Brace yourselves, everyone. This isn't an easy season.


Husband who chose me,
may our bond be as solid
as that of ravens.

February 13: Mob Scene

As soon as I stepped out the door for my run this morning, I heard them: the yelling mob. Raising my eyes to the curve of Mount Battie--the profile of which seems to echo the arc of the earth's horizon--I saw them: a scattered pattern of darting crows. Just as I was thinking to myself, The red-tailed hawk must be up there, a red-tailed hawk soared up out of the swirl of black forms. As I watched, feeling a smug satisfaction at having so quickly figured out what was going on, another red-tail separated itself from the flock. I hadn't known there were two! For a moment I could see both hawks circling the squalling horde of crows, and then they all dipped behind the rim of the mountain.

I could still hear the crows as I began my run. My rather labored outing was punctuated by birds: cardinal's pip, chickadees, several singing house finches making it seem like spring, downy woodpecker, flock of doves, a herring gull carrying a chunk of bread, black duck flushed on the river, goldfinches, beeping chorus of nuthatches. As I warmed up from the exertion and sun, I allowed myself to feel really excited about spring for the first time and to imagine how I'll soon be hearing more and more birds on my run.

But I was also thinking about the hawks. A pair of hawks. I've been seeing a hawk regularly along the river from my office up the street. But I hadn't realized there was a pair. Two hawks wouldn't be hanging out together unless they were a couple. (I just remembered that Valentine's Day, tomorrow, is the traditional day when birds find their mates, according to Chaucer's Parlement of Foules. The red-tails apparently got a jump start on ritual.) A pair of hawks in the vicinity of Mount Battie has some interesting implications for other resident raptors--including the pair of peregrine falcons that have nested  on Mount Megunticook for the past three years. They should be back in early spring, by April. And I think they'll have something to say about having red-tails as neighbors. Red-tailed hawks might be bigger, bulkier birds, but I'd bet on that avian torpedo, the peregrine, against just about any other raptor out there. So things could get interesting in the 'hood come spring. And the ever-vigilant crows will have even more to get worked up about.

Two hawks mobbed by crows--
the things one has to endure
as a mated pair.

February 12: Friday

It's been a long work week, and while I don't usually pull the "TGIF" thing, for some reason I'm particularly happy that this week is over. Not that I don't enjoy my job. To the contrary, I accomplished some satisfying things since Monday: I attended a valuable, day-long seminar, submitted a grant proposal, edited the Land Trust's Spring newsletter, and had a few great one-on-one meetings with board members. All stuff I find gratifying, but adding up to a full schedule. In addition, my husband has been sick with a bad cold that has caused him to hack loudly all night long, so my sleep hasn't been uninterrupted. To add to the week's excitement, I got a glimpse of a beautiful little poetry anthology that includes one of my poems: Maine in Four Seasons (Down East Books, June 2010). And to top it off, I went out after work three nights out of five this week--incredibly social for me. And the Winter Olympics start tonight! So between the busy-ness, various excitements, and spotty sleep patterns, it's been a full week, and I'm relieved to know I can sleep in tomorrow morning...

This isn't really the stuff of poetry in itself, but that ephemeral feeling of gratifying relief--combined with the simple pleasure of being able to sit down now and lose myself in Olympic fervor--is one to savor:

End of the work week,
start of Winter Olympics--
torches lit in snow.

February 11: Oysters

Tonight we went out to a raw bar with friends, and the four of us got at least a half-dozen each. I love oysters. There's the obvious sensual appeal of slurping the salty fleshy scrap of mollusk off the gritty half-shell. And there's also something deliciously elemental about eating this fruit of the sea--it tastes like the very ocean made tangible. We were enjoying Pemaquid oysters, grown locally not far from the very waters outside the restaurant windows. A medium-sized tasty oyster, made in Maine, they're one of my favorites. Confronted with an open oyster bar, I have been known to consume several dozen Pemaquid oysters in a minutes. I've never found myself too full of oysters.

I've been fortunate to have had the opportunity to visit several times an amazing private collection of 17th-century Dutch paintings, which includes such classics as a Brueghel winter village tableau, an Averkamp skating scene, and a van Ruisdael landscape with windmill. But the one I really enjoy looking at up close is a beautifully detailed still-life of food on a table by 17th century Flemish painter Osias Beert. I can't tell you what other food items make up this tableau--a peeled lemon, maybe?--because front and center is a plate of oysters on the half-shell that look so real you want to just reach out and grab one. Now that's a work of art!

Oyster: sea made flesh
slides easily down the throat,
mouthful of ocean.

February 10: Ghosts

Driving home from the gym tonight on Park Street, I passed the house where my grandfather died. The house doesn't always consciously register in my mind when I go by it--which is fairly often, being my main cut-across route from the Y. He only lived there for a few years before he passed away. While I spent a lot of time with him there when I was home from college, mowing his lawn and helping with house-cleaning, it never really felt like his true home to me. My entire life before that, he and my grandmother had lived on a saltwater farm with sheep, chickens, a pet goose, and a big organic garden in Lincolnville. After my grandmother died, he down-sized to the house in town as a way of making his daily life easier and renewing his social life. By his choice, it ended up being where he eventually succumbed to cancer. 

The few times that I think about this as I drive by, I wonder if the people who live there know that someone died in that downstairs room. And I wonder if there's anything of my grandfather's spirit left about the place, if the house is haunted. But if my grandfather's ghost is anywhere, I don't think it's lingering in that nondescript ranch house on Park Street. I would think if his spirit were going to linger, it would be hanging out again at Sea Bluffs, the old farm that was his life's joy... which has now been transformed into a luxury inn. You can sleep in my old bedroom (or his)--both utterly transformed--for $385 a night. My grandfather would have been amazed and delighted by that. 

My grandfather once told me that gulls were his favorite bird. A herring gull would hang out on their chimney, coming down to feed on table scraps strewn on the lawn when called (his name was Joseph). Joseph and his buddies were a constant presence, and my grandfather loved to watch them soar on the sea breeze. He said that it looked like they were sailing around just for the sheer pleasure of it, and that after he died, he'd like to come back as a gull so he could fly like that. Sometimes when I see a flock of gulls in the air, white wings illuminated by sun in a way that renders them positively angelic, I think, Maybe he's up there now, enjoying his wings. 

After passing his house this evening and remembering him thus, I arrived home to find a pre-pub copy of a Maine poetry anthology that includes one of my poems. The poem is an homage to my grandparents' kitchen--a place I remember in the minutest detail and with much love. Sadly, my name is misspelled in the book. The poem doesn't even properly carry my grandfather's surname--pretty much the only tangible thing I have left from him. But my grandfather loved me and was so proud of everything I ever accomplished. Even though they got my name wrong, his unshakeable support of everything I did would have made it seem okay. And he would have been so thrilled that a poem about his kitchen was published in a such a lovely little book. Here's the poem published in the anthology:

Kitchen

There is the ritual of icing the sugar cookies,

the sacrament of eating them:

sheep, reindeer, turkey, tree, little man.

There is the prayer of the old pressed tin ceiling,

litany of the clock with its waxing moon face,

blessing of the cast-iron potbelly stove

fragrant with coffee and rising bread.

The hymn of certain knowledge.

The psalm of bringing it back.

Whether he's a ghost or a gull or simply life essence in the ether, I know he's still with me somehow.

No longer a child
yet still missing what was lost,
I talk to your ghost.

February 9: Leaves in Buddha's Lap

As I left work tonight, enough of a glow remained in the sky that I didn't need a flashlight to find my car. Yet it was dark enough that I could clearly see the two brightest heavenly bodies in the sky--Mars and Sirius--bracketing Mount Battie. (The waning moon had not yet risen.) They were my celestial escorts as I headed into town on my way to the Y. When I got there, I realized I'd forgotten to bring my running stuff. I took that as a sign that I wasn't meant to run tonight and turned around to head home for an unexpectedly free hour. Back between the Red Planet and the Dog Star I went, my mind still churning on work.

As I walked up the front step of my home, a nearby streetlight illuminated the statue of Buddha in my flower bed. He's been buried under snow most of the winter. While the mid-Atlantic states have been getting dumped on the past week or so, our snow has been disappearing, sublimating into the sublime blue skies of these sunny days. So there was Buddha, half-heaped in snowy dead leaves. I thought about clearing away the detritus but decided to let it be. His mildly amused expression caught by the light, Buddha looked completely at peace sitting there with that lapful of dead leaves and ice.

Leaving Buddha, the war god, and the twinkling dog star behind me, I unlocked my front door and suddenly felt a complete sense of calm. Some things ease our minds by drawing us outside ourselves--calling our attention to the infinite reaches of the night sky, for example. Others help us empty the mind and think less: be here now; shut down busy thoughts by briefly meditating on an object of beauty. And then open the door and cross the threshold into the next moment.

Leaves in Buddha's lap--
dry offerings of winter.
Remember: life's short.

February 8: Pint o' Beer

Some days it's hard to find poetry. I spent the entire day in a seminar, rushed through my e-mails during the breaks, and then, when I got home, finished up some other work that had been put off because of the seminar. Where does one find poetry amid all that busy-ness?

I guess I'd have to say I found it in the glass of beer I ordered with my dinner: a pint of Geary's Hampshire Special Ale. I can't remember when I last had a beer, and it tasted really good. Made in Maine, too.

Also, then I read this article about how drinking beer enhances bone density. And Wickipedia tells me that it's the oldest fermented beverage. So by downing my beer tonight, I was staving off osteoporosis, enjoying a brief flashback to college, relaxing after a hectic workday, and carrying on a tradition enjoyed around the world for millenia. (And--though I didn't realize it at the time--toasting my 100th blog post to my Book of Days.) All that in one 16-ounce glass.

Tapping liquid bread
like erudite monks of old,
I channel the past.

February 7: Fireworks

As part of the US National Toboggan Championships held in Camden this weekend, last night there was a fireworks show over Camden Harbor. When told we were going to see them, my niece, who was born on July 5, was confused. "Is tomorrow my birthday?" she asked hopefully, if a bit confused. "Am I going to be four?" We had to explain that these were special fireworks, not like the ones she remembered seeing in Marblehead Harbor this past summer the night before her birthday. Fireworks are fireworks, so even though her birthday wasn't involved, she was still excited.

Bundled in many layers under her little down parka (the bottom layer of which was her shiny blue, pink, and silver-spotted princess dress), Fiona was probably warmer than we adults were. In fact, I offered to carry her on my shoulders just for the added body heat. And perched there amid the small throng gathered at the public landing, she had a perfect view of the display.

Unlike most nights when Camden plans fireworks, last night was perfect (OK, it could have been about 30 degrees warmer, but other than that...) After a striking pink sunset, the night sky was crystal clear, Orion shone bright over Curtis Island--I was able to point out his belt to Fiona--and Mars hovered above the plastic-wrapped windjammers. The walkway at the public landing was lit by pretty ice votives. And the fireworks went on just long enough to make it feel like a worthwhile outing, while not so prolonged that we risked serious frostbite.

When we watched the Fourth of July fireworks this past summer, Fiona was too sensitive to the loud bangs they made to enjoy the spectacle of the light show. Now she was just enough older that she was able to appreciate the bursts of color despite having to cover her ears. Watching fireworks with a kid reminds you how much fun they are. We all "oohed" and "aahed" right along with my niece as we admired the sparkling greens and pinks, the blossoming flowers of sparks and sizzling streamers spread out over the water of the outer harbor. The crowd cheered more than once after a particularly prolonged burst of pyrotechnics, and the grand finale sent us all on our way aglow with the shared fun of small-town pleasures. Now, time to hit the pizza place...

Over the harbor
winter fireworks burst and bloom.
Little girl's face glows.