A fine, clear day. There is a glare of light from the fresh surface of the snow, so that it pains the eyes to travel toward the sun.
February 10, 2022
I go across Walden. My shadow is very blue. It is especially blue when there is a bright sunlight on pure white snow. It suggests that there may be something divine, something celestial, in me.
In many places the edges of drifts are sharp and curving, almost a complete circle, reflecting a blue color from within like blue-tinted shells.
I hear the faint metallic chirp of a tree sparrow in the yard from time to time, or perchance the mew of a linaria. It is worth the while to let some pigweed grow in your garden, if only to attract these winter visitors. It would be a pity to have these weeds burned in the fall. Of the former I see in the winter but three or four commonly at a time; of the latter, large flocks. This in and after considerable snow-storms.
Since this deeper snow, the landscape is more wintry than before; the rivers and roads are more concealed than they have been, and billows of snow succeed each other across the fields and roads, like an ocean waste.
H. D. Thoreau, Journal, February 10, 1855
My shadow is blue. It is especially blue when there is a bright sunlight on pure white snow. See February 6, 1854 ("Crossing Walden where the snow has fallen quite level, I perceive that my shadow is a delicate or transparent blue."); January 4, 1856 ("I think it is only such a day as this, when the fields on all sides are well clad with snow, over which the sun shines brightly, that you observe the blue shadows on the snow."); January 15, 1856 ("My shadow is a most celestial blue. This only requires a clear bright day and snow-clad earth, not great cold. "); January 18, 1856 ("Clear and bright, yet I see the blue shadows on the snow at Walden. . . .I am in raptures at my own shadow") Also see note to January 6, 1856 ("Now, at 4.15, the blue shadows are very distinct on the snow-banks.”)
I hear the faint metallic chirp of a tree sparrow in the yard from time to time, or perchance the mew of a linaria. It is worth the while to let some pigweed grow in your garden, if only to attract these winter visitors. It would be a pity to have these weeds burned in the fall. Of the former I see in the winter but three or four commonly at a time; of the latter, large flocks. This in and after considerable snow-storms.
Since this deeper snow, the landscape is more wintry than before; the rivers and roads are more concealed than they have been, and billows of snow succeed each other across the fields and roads, like an ocean waste.
H. D. Thoreau, Journal, February 10, 1855
My shadow is blue. It is especially blue when there is a bright sunlight on pure white snow. See February 6, 1854 ("Crossing Walden where the snow has fallen quite level, I perceive that my shadow is a delicate or transparent blue."); January 4, 1856 ("I think it is only such a day as this, when the fields on all sides are well clad with snow, over which the sun shines brightly, that you observe the blue shadows on the snow."); January 15, 1856 ("My shadow is a most celestial blue. This only requires a clear bright day and snow-clad earth, not great cold. "); January 18, 1856 ("Clear and bright, yet I see the blue shadows on the snow at Walden. . . .I am in raptures at my own shadow") Also see note to January 6, 1856 ("Now, at 4.15, the blue shadows are very distinct on the snow-banks.”)
It is worth the while to let some pigweed grow in your garden, if only to attract these winter visitors. January 2, 1856 ("I see, near the back road and railroad, a small flock of eight snow buntings feeding on the the seeds of the pigweed.”); January 19, 1855 (“At noon it is still a driving snow-storm, and a little flock of redpolls is busily picking the seeds of the pigweed in the garden.”); February 9, 1855 ("I was so sure this storm would bring snowbirds into the yard that I went to the window at ten to look for them, and there they were.“); February 13, 1853 ("I am called to window to see a dense flock of snowbirds on and under the pigweed in the garden .") Compare March 25, 1856 ("I have not seen a tree sparrow, nuthatch, creeper, nor more than one redpoll since Christmas. They probably went further south."); April 17, 1854 ("Did not see a linaria the past winter, though they were the prevailing bird the winter before.") See also A Book of the Seasons,by Henry Thoreau, Winter Birds; A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Lesser Redpoll; A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Tree Sparrow
Since this deeper snow, the landscape is more wintry than before; the rivers and roads are more concealed. See February 1, 1855 ("[The river] is now one uninterrupted level white blanket of snow quite to the shore on every side.").
February 10. See A Book of the Seasons,by Henry Thoreau, February 10
My shadow is blue.
Bright sunlight on pure white snow –
celestial me.
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, My shadow is very blue
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau
"A book, each page written in its own season,
out-of-doors, in its own locality.”
~edited, assembled and rewritten by zphx © 2009-2025
https://tinyurl.com/hdt-550210
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