We visited the Defries Calendar Garden in the bright sunlight of a June midday. Here's a glowing desert flower, and an echo in two glowing pond flowers. And the golden eye of a tiny amphibian half hidden by a water lily leaf, sitting in a puddle and reflecting sparks of light. (It looks as big as the water lilies in these photos, but was about half the size of one of the petals). Then there's the sunlight glow of arched clematis leaves and the peculiar squiggles of an allium head.
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The play of sun and shadow on leaves becomes abstract art -- more so when the breeze is tossing the branches and the light and shadow play is ever changing. Here's more glorious green from my day at Pathways Retreat earlier this week.
I had a retreat day at the cottage at Pathways Retreat this week and had the good fortune to be there on a breezy, sun-soaked spring day. I was surrounded by green woods, leaves dancing between light and shadow, the rustle of the breeze in the trees, bright bursts of pine scent, and a few white blossoms.
We returned from our travels to find green had arrived in Goshen while we were gone, reminding me of a short song learned from a college friend on a long trip years ago:
To ope' their trunks the trees are never seen. How then do they put on their robes of green? They leaf them out. Green's not the only color in sight, as flowers begin to blossom. Along the path we've been walking near the dam, there's the light purple of wild geranium along with the new spring green leaves. And there are the maroon bells of paw paw trees, with the maroon echoed in the trillium flowers below. More from Tuesday's stroll through the Shoup-Parsons Woods, with spring flowers flourishing. The may apples are spreading green umbrellas, jack-in-the-pulpits proclaim spring, a fallen "caterpillar" blossom curves gracefully on a piece of bark. I bent to take a photo of trillium ready to open, and was amazed by an eight inch lacy leaf skeleton wrapping the fallen log beside them. And a little further along the path, I discovered a whole congregation of jack-in-the-pulpits. They were a pale green in comparison with the first two I saw -- a different variety or different growing conditions or just further along in their growth?
By the way, the bronze-colored trees nearing blossom that I posted last week turn out to be buckeyes and native to Indiana. Thanks, Aaron Sawatsky-Kingsley for the identification! I was able to get down to the path along the millrace and through the woods by the dam during a brief period of sunshine yesterday. Glorious new green growth is opening everywhere -- interspersed with the greys and tans of last year's remnants. And the occasional bright red and yellow flash of a red-winged blackbird, and the echo of its konk-la-ree call. Springtime!
I don't know what this plant is, but its leaves are opening with a enthusiastic bronze burst. There were enough in this section of the Shoup-Parsons Woods to give a bronze tint to the underlayer. Some look like they will soon bloom. One cluster was a burst of bright green in the sunlight. Spring!
With snow on the ground and frigid temperatures outside, I am enjoying the play of light and life indoors -- an early blooming Christmas cactus with blossoms in flight, green and burgundy begonia leaves with light-filled veins, a swan-like gourd eye-ing the remnants of Thanksgiving decor, the light-edged leaves of succulents, and a Carolina wren that somehow found its way into our screened back porch where it found a congenial perch. I propped the door open for it when I left to run errands and by the time I got back, it had found the way out.
Two nights of hard frost earlier this week, with little wind, and the following day the leaves dropped, straight down, creating round carpets under each tree, at least until the wind picked up.
A walk along the millrace was grays and browns, instead of last week's sun-filled golds, but there were still intriguing reflections to be seen. And with most of the leaves gone, there were other sights -- stem scars, grape vine knots, and black walnuts in odd places. One early morning last week I walked into my spiritual direction room, ready to spend some time working on a retreat with the theme Tending the Fire. The sun was barely up and the room was shadowy, but the view out the window made me pause in delight. Overnight the leaves on the neighbor's tulip poplar tree had turned golden.
It wasn't hard to find fiery fall light this past week, filling the leaves with glory. For some, even their veins seemed full of fire. |
My approach to contemplative photography --
"Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it." Mary Oliver in "Sometimes" Archives
August 2020
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