The leafless deciduous trees and shrubs offer us a chance to see the high life in a new way. Bird nests are exposed. Waiting raptors are more easily spotted. The strong limbs and branches are exposed to view. A new stage holds our attention.
My dogs cornered a family of raccoons up in some Fremont poplars. A mother and two baby raccoons sat quietly in the branches, swaying in the wind, carefully eyeing the dogs. The dogs had killed one baby racoon, and their blood thirst kept them eyeing the possums and waiting for a second chance at the joys of killing. A standoff! I put the dogs in their run, and watched the raccoons make their way out of danger into the grazing fields to the east.
The winter months allow ones eyes to track the skies. Gone are the blazing days of summer, the bright sun, the hats, the retreats into the shade. The winter sky is filled with dramatic clouds, birds from Canada wintering in California's Great Valley, and vast skylines of dark tree trunks and branches framed like abstract sculptures against the subdued sky. The mind's eyes travel the soft skies right up to the snowcapped peaks: Lassen, Shasta Bolly, the Trinity Alps, and to the far northern gem of the north state - Mount Shasta.
"Trees are poems that the Earth writes upon the sky,
We fell them down and turn them into paper,
That we may record our emptiness."
- Kahlil Gibran
Violent Pacific storms in December brought trees down everywhere. They lie piled in the orchards and in yards and lawns everywhere. Felled by Winter. Most are turned into firewood. But they are missed. The empty spaces touch us. Gaps in our reality. Holes in space. Sculptures in
emptiness.
January - Quotes and Poems for Gardeners
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