A spring arrival

Photo credit: Sister in Law Unit.

Spring is here and one unexpected sign of it is a baby great horned owlet that was recently born on our hill. He (or she) is pretty cute.

Speaking of spring, here's a great quote about it by George Orwell. I posted this on Facebook a while back. Sorry for the duplication but something this good deserves to be read more than once.

“ I think that by retaining one’s childhood love of such things as trees, fishes, butterflies and—to return to my first instance—toads, one makes a peaceful and decent future a little more probable…

At any rate, spring is here...and they can't stop you enjoying it. This is a satisfying reflection. How many a time have I stood watching the toads mating, or a pair of hares having a boxing match in the young corn, and thought of all the important persons who would stop me enjoying this if they could. But luckily they can't. So long as you are not actually ill, hungry, frightened or immured in a prison or a holiday camp, spring is still spring. The atom bombs are piling up in the factories, the police are prowling through the cities, the lies are streaming from the loudspeakers, but the earth is still going round the sun, and neither the dictators nor the bureaucrats, deeply as they disapprove of the process, are able to prevent it." George Orwell, Some Thoughts on the Common Toad

 Orwell didn't explicitly mention owls, but I think he'd be down with them.

They're back

One nice thing about this time of year in El Cabrero's beloved state of West Virginia is the blooming of the redbuds, which come to think about it aren't exactly red. These little trees are pretty inconspicuous most of they year but in the spring (earlier these days due to weird weather), they burst into glory and can make even a human-trashed landscape look pretty. Or prettier anyway.

SAVING LIVES, CUTTING COSTS. Happy 2nd birthday, health care reform! Here's hoping it doesn't get gutted by the supremes.

I DID NOT WRITE THIS scathing editorial about right wing Whackadoodles. But I kind of wish I did.

GETTING TAX BREAKS, BUYING POLITICIANS. Here's a look at some corporate tax dodgers and what they do with all that spare money.

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: ELEVATED

Weekend spring poem

First day of spring--
I keep thinking about
the end of autumn.--Matsuo Basho, 1644-1694

Spring

Sound the Flute!
Now it's mute.
Birds delight
Day and Night
Nightingale
In the dale
Lark in Sky
Merrily
Merrily Merrily to welcome in the Year

Little Boy
Full of joy,
Little Girl
Sweet and small,
Cock does crow
So do you.
Merry voice
Infant noise
Merrily Merrily to welcome in the Year

Little Lamb
Here I am.
Come and lick
My white neck.
Let me pull
Your soft Wool.
Let me kiss
Your soft face
Merrily Merrily we welcome in the Year

William Blake

Lines Written in Early Spring (by someone else)

I heard a thousand blended notes,
While in a grove I sate reclined,
In that sweet mood when pleasant thoughts
Bring sad thoughts to the mind.

To her fair works did Nature link
The human soul that through me ran;
And much it grieved my heart to think
What man has made of man.

Through primrose tufts, in that green bower,
The periwinkle trailed its wreaths;
And ’tis my faith that every flower
Enjoys the air it breathes.

The birds around me hopped and played,
Their thoughts I cannot measure:--
But the least motion which they made
It seemed a thrill of pleasure.

The budding twigs spread out their fan,
To catch the breezy air;
And I must think, do all I can,
That there was pleasure there.

If this belief from heaven be sent,
If such be Nature’s holy plan,
Have I not reason to lament
What man has made of man?

William Wordsworth 1798

A Light exists in Spring

A Light exists in Spring
Not present on the Year
At any other period —
When March is scarcely here

A Color stands abroad
On Solitary Fields
That Science cannot overtake
But Human Nature feels.

It waits upon the Lawn,
It shows the furthest Tree
Upon the furthest Slope you know
It almost speaks to you.

Then as Horizons step
Or Noons report away
Without the Formula of sound
It passes and we stay —

A quality of loss
Affecting our Content
As Trade had suddenly encroached
Upon a Sacrament.

--Emily Dickinson

This whole Experiment of Green

On the subject of spring, Luna the clown says "Bring it on!"

A little madness in the Spring
Is wholesome even for the King,
But God be with the Clown —
Who ponders this tremendous scene —
This whole Experiment of Green —
As if it were his own!

--the divine Miss Emily Dickinson

To Spring

O thou with dewy locks, who lookest down
Through the clear windows of the morning, turn
Thine angel eyes upon our western isle,
Which in full choir hails thy approach, O Spring!

The hills tell one another, and the listening
Valleys hear; all our longing eyes are turn’d
Up to thy bright pavilions: issue forth
And let thy holy feet visit our clime!

Come o’er the eastern hills, and let our winds
Kiss thy perfumèd garments; let us taste
Thy morn and evening breath; scatter thy pearls
Upon our lovesick land that mourns for thee.

O deck her forth with thy fair fingers; pour
Thy soft kisses on her bosom; and put
Thy golden crown upon her languish’d head,
Whose modest tresses are bound up for thee.

William Blake

GOAT ROPE ADVISORY LEVEL: BROKEN