Still There

Giant storms and earthquakes and volcanoes spewing ash. Schoolyard bully-style name calling, missiles flying and jets swooping, hydrogen bomb threats... it's a wonder we can sleep at all.

When I woke today from a restless night, the world was still there, so I took a walk in it.

It was pretty cloudy when I started out, but the sunlight slid right through the mist covering the mountains.

My phone camera did its best to capture the emerging light.

Beany, dirty face and all, kept a careful eye on me, 

while Weetzie watched the great blue heron that accompanied us, up ahead and just out of camera range. 

Farm workers have picked truckload after truckload of green chiles from these fields. Now they wait for the last ones to turn red for the red chile harvest.

I know the farmers rightly dislike the field bindweed, but its flowers are beautiful among the red chiles. I saw some tomatillos growing in among the plants, too. 

I need to stop watching the news and take my cues from nature. 

Here is Arthur Symons' poem, In the Wood of Finvara, first published in 1896. Although my heron is no fairy bird, and Symons speaks of "sea and sea" and fairy woods and not of the desert and its irrigated valleys, he knows my heart.

I have grown tired of sorrow and human tears;

Life is a dream in the night, a fear among fears,

A naked runner lost in a storm of spears.

I have grown tired of rapture and love's desire;

Love is a flaming heart, and its flames aspire

         

Till they cloud the soul in the smoke of a windy fire.

  

I would wash the dust of the world in a soft green flood;

Here between sea and sea, in the fairy wood,

I have found a delicate, wave-green solitude.

  

Here, in the fairy wood, between sea and sea,

  

I have heard the song of a fairy bird in a tree,

And the peace that is not in the world has flown to me.

Joy in the Morning

"...weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning..." (Psalm 30)

"O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!" (Jabberwocky, by Lewis Carroll)

This morning's walk was filled with the joyful sights and sounds of spring. My companions were the little dog, Weetzie...

...and the youngest pup, Beany.

We stopped by the place down the road where the banty hen has just hatched out three chicks. She was out in the field, teaching them chicken things, but was too far away for a photo. We heard geese and peacocks, distant and unseen. 

Then we crossed into the pecan orchard, where the trees have leafed out and are making us sneeze. Oh, but they are lovely, and we will all appreciate the shade they provide in the coming heat of summer, not to mention the pecans later in the fall.

We passed by the dog who never gets walked, but who appreciates a hello when he peeks out of his pen at us. Then we saw the escape artist dog, Mr. Socks, who was out for a jolly free gallop through the orchard. He'll be in timeout tomorrow, I'm sure. We were cautious as we passed the gate of the noisy Mr. Bounce, who is a cattle dog with very springy legs who leaps up behind his stone wall, again and again, getting glimpses of us only when he reaches maximum altitude. 

As we walked down the irrigation ditch pathway, we came to the farm with the chickens and the foster dogs. They are a lively bunch, all of them. The same place has three horses that Beany likes to visit.

We crossed the country road to check out the newly plowed and planted fields. I'm not sure yet what will be growing there (cabbage? chiles? cotton?), but we like to keep an eye on things. Just past the field you can see a light green orchard of young pecan trees, and beyond that, a mature orchard. Watching over all are the Organ Mountains, the first thing I see out my window in the morning. 

Turning the last corner, we came to "our" orchard, which is the one that surrounds our small property. We don't own it or pay taxes on it or have to labor in it, but it gives us pleasure every day, and is a place where grackles, white-winged doves, killdeer, robins, hawks, owls, coyotes, skunks, raccoons, and the occasional tarantula pass through.

And then we arrived home to our little adobe cottage, where the hollyhocks bloom and the mockingbird sings.