Ice on the water
Snow on the hill
Remembers the breath of the whippoorwill
Remembers the April
Remembers May
A sudden shower on a summer day
Whales and starfish hearts it fed
And garden pools by sunsets red
Filled a teacup
And a leaf
Drowned a baby
Bathed a thief
Drifted in clouds on the bright sun's brow
Frozen in crystal
Timeless
For now
I was rummaging through a drawer for a notebook and happened across a really old one full of my scribblings and poetry from about thirty years ago. Apparently, I used to write quite a lot. I had forgotten.
Most of it was the drek you'd expect: self centered, meaning-of-life navel gazing. Even I found Young Me tiresome. But her little rhyme seemed appropriate for the occasion today, so I dusted it off and paired it with a photo from the archives for you.
The image is what happens when ice forms on standing water, then partially melts. The water level falls, then freezes again. Then it melts, the level falls again, and so on. We have seen up to four thin sheets of ice suspended in the air in the weeds like this.
Young Me lived when there was no Internet, no personal computers, no digital cameras. Wonder what she would think of it all.
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13 comments:
The poem's beautiful.
I'm so glad that I was without internet during my teenage years. That would have been embarrassing. Reading my old diaries is bad enough.
Such a mega-gorgeous capture...enchanting and mysterious..and beautiful words!
Oh please don't feel guilty for feeding the birds...leave all the guilt to me.. without it many of them would not survive the winter or would come through in very bad shape for breeding..I didn't mean that by the post.....really...
Beautiful shot. I love to see what patterns form in ice when I empty out the bird bath. I like your poem a lot.
Wow..the 'you' at any age is amazing. I love the poem and how you took something so easily overlooked.. such depth in the photo.
Beautiful ice flower. I don't even want to start thinking about all the things that weren't around in my younger days.
Jedediah, I'm glad too that we had books and letters instead. It's a different mindset altogether.
Kiki, glad you liked it! I'm fascinated with geodes, especially. Little crystal caves, hidden in the dark.
Michelle, the ice terraces are indeed something most people don't notice, which is too bad. And about the birds, I'm really guilty about not cleaning the feeders and ground the way you do. I hope I haven't killed anything.
Carver, thanks :-) Ice patterns are magical things, aren't they.
Marvin, I know what you mean. I've been thinking about that for a while now. This is really such a different world than the one I grew up in. Better in ways, in others worse.
I love this shot. As a kid, I used to love cracking the thin ice with my feet. Oh, I still love doing that.
Leora, I love that too! It's such a satisfying crack and crunch.
Excellent, thought-provoking post. Your Younger You poetry fit quite nicely, and was lovely. I wouldn't have missed growing up in a world without for anything! I even resisted owning a computer until just a year ago.
This is a wonderful photo of the fragile ice melting.
Ha! I am sooooo glad there was no internet when I was a kid. I was a pretty good kid but still I'm sure I'd have posted a few things I should have kept to myself.
Kaholly, I agree. Ironically enough, kids are missing out by having more now.
EG, I'm sure I would have found a way to get into trouble with internet access, if I had had it when I was young. Have to say, though, I'd be lost without it now!
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