the great surge of life

3.20.24 ~ hermit thrush, North Carolina Botanical Garden

I lack roots, I cannot fly on my own wings, and I do not burrow into the earth. But I am a part of something vastly bigger than myself. I am a part of the enduring force, of life itself. And the great surge of life occurs every springtime. It is this that I am made aware of now.
~ Hal Borland
(Hal Borland’s Book of Days)

fragrant sumac

Another favorite walk in the botanical garden, savoring every possible moment of this memorable spring flowering. Longtime locals have been telling us that this spring has come earlier here than it has in previous years. The last rose I found on this bush (below) was in November and this one in March is the first rose since then.

first ‘old blush’ rose of the season
Venus flytraps poking up from the soil
wild blue phlox
Carolina wren
white trout lily
 limestone bittercress aka purple cress
‘finch’s golden’ deciduous holly

I’m planning to get a once a month picture from this spot (below) on the boardwalk. The areas on either side here were part of a subscribed burn sometime after we found the seedbox plant in January.

Coastal Plain Habitat boardwalk in March
3.20.24 ~ Courtyard Gardens
Spring Equinox (8 seasons series)

Spring has returned — and now the earth is
like a child who has learned her poems by heart.
So many, so many … and for all her hard
and lengthy studies now she takes the prize.

~ Rainer Maria Rilke
(Sonnets to Orpheus)

eastern redbud cauliflory

Cauliflory is a botanical term referring to plants that flower and fruit from their main stems or woody trunks, rather than from new growth and shoots. It is rare in temperate regions but common in tropical forests.
~ Wikipedia

Learning something new every day… I’m trying to remember the word cauliflory by thinking of cauliflower. (I’m still having trouble remembering the word marcescence even after using it countless time on this blog…) This wonderful botanical garden is never the same twice.

a point of connection

6.2.17 ~ Avery Pond, Groton, Connecticut
great egret by Timothy Rodgers

The camera is an excuse to be someplace you otherwise don’t belong. It gives me both a point of connection and a point of separation.
~ Susan Meiselas
(Whitney Museum of American Art: Handbook of the Collection)

black-crowned night heron (?) by Timothy Rodgers

One evening last week Tim took the camera down to the beach and the salt pond and came home with these beautiful shots! I’m pretty sure the bird above is a black-crowned night heron, but if I’m wrong I hope someone will correct me…

swan by Timothy Rodgers

The swan, like the soul of the poet,
By the dull world is ill understood.
~ Heinrich Heine
(Early Poems, Evening Songs)

swan and cygnet by Timothy Rodgers

When words become unclear, I shall focus with photographs. When images become inadequate, I shall be content with silence.
~ Ansel Adams
(3000 Astounding Quotes)

double-crested cormorant by Timothy Rodgers

Photography takes an instant out of time, altering life by holding it still.
~ Dorothea Lange
(Ancestors in the Attic: Making Family Memorabilia into History)

courting pair of double-crested cormorants by Timothy Rodgers

poetry, physics, possibility

“Stéphane Mallarmé’s Poetry
(Listening To Flowers)”
by Fernand Khnopff

I dwell in Possibility —
A fairer House than prose —
More numerous of Windows —
Superior — for Doors —

Of Chambers as the Cedars —
Impregnable of eye —
And for an everlasting Roof
The Gambrels of the Sky —

Of Visitors — the fairest —
For Occupation — This —
The spreading wide my narrow Hands
To gather Paradise —

~ Emily Dickinson
(The Poems of Emily Dickinson, #466)

~

Poetry, physics — same thing!
~ The Doctor
(Doctor Who, Series 10 Episode 1)