How to spend this afternoon.

April 29.

The art of life, of a poet's life, is, not having anything to do, to do something.

The leaves are dry enough to burn; and I see a smoke this afternoon in the west horizon. There is a slight haziness on the woods, as I go to Mayflower Road at 2:30 P.M.

The ground is dry. I smell the dryness of the woods. Their shadows look more inviting, and I am reminded of the hum of bees.

The pines have an appearance they have not worn before, yet not easy to describe. The mottled sunlight and shade, seen looking into the woods, is more like summer. 

At the Second Division Brook the cowslip is in blossom. 

The butterflies are now more numerous, red and blue-black or dark velvety. 

Observe two thrushes arrived that I do not know. 

Discover a hawk over my head by his shadow on the ground.

The acorns among the leaves are sprouted, the shells open and the blushing (red) meat exposed at the sprout end, where the sprout is already turning toward the earth. 

Coming home over the Corner road, the sun, now getting low, is reflected very bright and silvery from the water on the meadows, seen through the pines of Hubbard's Grove. 

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 29, 1852

The art of life, not having anything to do, is to do something. See September 13, 1852 ("To the . . . idle man, the stillness of a placid September day sounds like the din and whirl of a factory. Only employment can still this din in the air.");   September 8, 1858 ("It is good policy to be stirring about your affairs, for the reward of activity and energy is that if you do not accomplish the object you had professed to yourself, you do accomplish something else.”); and note to September 7, 1851: ("I do not remember any page which will tell me how to spend this afternoon.”); See also December 29, 1841 ("One does not soon learn the trade of life. That one may work out a true life requires more art and delicate skill than any other work.") and A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, To effect the quality of the day

At the Second Division Brook [o]bserve two thrushes arrived that I do not know. See note to April 24, 1856 ("Returning, in the low wood just this side the first Second Division Brook, near the meadow, see a brown bird flit, and behold my hermit thrush, with one companion, flitting silently through the birches”)

Discover a hawk over my head by his shadow on the ground. See September 27, 1857 ("I see the shadow of a hawk flying above and behind me.”)

The art of life – not 

having anything to do –

is to do something.

The succession of herbaceous flowers (all blossom at once?)

April 28.

How suddenly the flowers bloom! 

Two or three days ago I could not, or did not, find the leaves of the crowfoot.  To-day, not knowing it well, I look in vain, till at length, in the very warmest nook in the grass above the rocks of the Cliff, I find two bright-yellow blossoms, which betray the inconspicuous leaves and all. 

The spring flowers wait not to perfect their leaves before they expand their blossoms. The blossom in so many cases precedes the leaf; so with poetry? They flash out.

Spring flowers flash out –

the blossom precedes the leaf.

So with poetry?

April 28, 2017

April 28, 2017

April 28, 2017

April 28, 2013

April 28, 2012

April 28, 2012

In the most favorable locality you will find flowers earlier than the May goers will believe. 

This year, at least, one flower hardly precedes another, but as soon as the storms are over and pleasant weather comes, all blossom at once, having been retarded so long. 

This appears to be particularly true of the herbaceous flowers. How much does this happen every year?

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 28, 1852

The blossom in so many cases precedes the leaf. See May 10, 1852 ("How closely the flower follows upon, if it does not precede, the leaf! The leaves are but calyx and escort to the flower.")

As soon as the storms are over and pleasant weather comes, all blossom at once. See  April 9, 1854 ("The flowers have blossomed very suddenly this year as soon as the long cold spell was over, and almost all together.")

Suddenly flowers! 

As soon as the storms are over

all blossom at once.

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, All blossom at once.

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 ©  2009-2024

tinyurl.com/hdt-520428

Spring re-creation

April 28.

Are not the flowers which appear earliest in the spring the most primitive and simplest?

In this town thus far as I have observed the earliest to flower this spring, putting them down in order, 

• the first six are decidedly water or water-loving plants, and 
• the l0th, 13th, and 14th were found in the water and are equally if not more confined to that element. 
• The 7th and 8th belong to the cooler zones of the earth; 
• the 7th, comes on burnt lands first and will grow in dry, cool, dreary places. 
• The 9th on a dry, warm rocky hillside,-- also the 18th; 
• the 11th and 12th in cold, damp gardens, like the earth first made dry land; 
• the 15th and 17th on dry (scantily clad with grass) fields and hills, hardy; 
• the 16th, sunny bare rocks, in seams on moss, where also in a day or two the columbine will bloom. 
• The 18th is also indebted to the warmth of the rocks.

This may, perhaps, be nearly the order of the world's creation.  Such were the first localities afforded for plants, water-bottoms, bare rocks, and scantily clad lands, and land recently bared of water.  

Thus we have in the spring of the year the spring of the world represented.  

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 28, 1852

We have in the spring of the year the spring of the world represented. See April 27, 1852 (" I find to-day for the first time the early saxifrage (Saxifraga vernalis) in blossom, growing high and dry in the narrow seams, where there is no soil for it but a little green moss. Following thus early after the bare rock, it is one of the first flowers, not only in the spring of the year, but in the spring of the world.”); February 11, 1854 (“[T]hey must have preceded other trees in the order of creation, as they precede them annually in their blossoming and leafing."); May 22, 1858 ("So was it also in a former geological age, when water and water-plants prevailed and before man was here to behold them. The sun was then reflected from the lily pad after the May storm as brightly as now.”); June 6, 1853 ("The spring, that early age of the world, following hard on the reign of water and the barren rocks yet dripping with it, is past.”)
 

Early cliff dwellers

April 27.

Heard the field or rush sparrow this morning (Fringilla juncorum), George Minott's "huckleberry-bird." It sits on a birch and sings at short intervals, apparently answered from a distance. It is clear and sonorous heard afar; but I found it quite impossible to tell from which side it came; sounding like phe, phe, phe, pher-pher-tw-tw-tw-t-t-t-t, — the first three slow and loud, the next two syllables quicker, and the last part quicker and quicker, becoming a clear, sonorous trill or rattle, like a spoon in a saucer. 

Heard also a chipping sparrow (F. socialis). 

It has rained a little in the night. The landscape is still dark and wet. The hills look very dank, but I notice that some houses, one yellow one especially, look much better in this light.

On Conantum Cliffs, whose seams dip to the northwest at an angle of 50° and run northeast and  southwest, I find to-day for the first time the early saxifrage (Saxifraga vernalis) in blossom, growing high and dry in the narrow seams, where there is no soil for it but a little green moss.

Early Saxifrage

April 27, 2024

Following thus early after the bare rock, it is one of the first flowers, not only in the spring of the year, but in the spring of the world.  It can take advantage of a perpendicular cliff where the snow cannot lie and fronting the south.

In exactly the same places grows the columbine, now well budded and seven or eight inches high. The higher up the rock and the more sheltered and sunny the location, the earlier they are.

Also the first plantain-leaved everlasting (Gray's Antennaria plantaginifolia) is in blossom in a sheltered place in the grass at the top of the rock. The thimble-berry and the sweet-briar are partly leaved out in the crevices of the rock, and the latter emits its fragrance.

The half-open buds of the saxifrage, showing the white of the petals in a corymb or cyme, on a short stem, surrounded by its new leaves mingled with the purplish tips of the calyx-leaves, is handsomer than when it is fully expanded.

This is a place to look for early blossoms of the saxifrage, columbine, and plantain-leaved everlasting, - the first two especially. The crevices of the rock (cliff) make natural hothouses for them, affording dryness, warmth, and shelter.    

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 27, 1852

Heard the field or rush sparrow this morning (Fringilla juncorum), George Minott's "huckleberry-bird."  See April 27, 1855 (“The principal singer on this walk, both in wood and field away from town, is the field sparrow.”) See also April 9, 1856 (“Wandering over that high huckleberry pasture, I hear the sweet jingle of the Fringilla juncorum.”) and A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Field Sparrow

Heard also a chipping sparrow (F. socialis) See April 27, 1857 (“I hear the prolonged che che che che che, etc., of the chip-bird.”); and note to April 12, 1858 ("Hear the huckleberry-bird and, I think, the Fringilla socialis.”)   See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Chipping Sparrow (Fringilla socialis ).

I find to-day for the first time the early saxifrage . . . following early after the bare rock, it is one of the first flowers, not only in the spring of the year, but in the spring of the world.  See April 3, 1853 ("To my great surprise the saxifrage is in bloom. . . .With what skill it secures moisture and heat, growing commonly in a little bed of moss which keeps it moist, and lying low in some cleft of the rock! The sunniest and most sheltered exposures possible it secures. This faced the southeast, was nearly a foot under the eaves of the rock."); See also April 28, 1852 ("Are not the flowers which appear earliest in the spring the most primitive and simplest?") and A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Saxifrage in Spring (Saxifraga vernalis)

In exactly the same places grows the columbine, now well budded and seven or eight inches high. The higher up the rock and the more sheltered and sunny the location, the earlier they are. See March 18, 1853 ("At Conantum Cliff the columbines have started and the saxifrage even, the former as conspicuously as any plant . . . Both these grow there in high and dry chinks in the face of tire cliff, where no soil appears, and the sunnier the exposure the more advanced. Even if a fallen fragment of the rock is so placed as to reflect the heat upon it, it has the start of its neighbors. These plants waste not a day, not a moment, suitable to their development. "); April 1, 1855 (" At the first Conantum Cliff I am surprised to see how much the columbine leaves have grown in a sheltered cleft.");April 7, 1855 ("At Lee’s Cliff I find the radical leaves of the early saxifrage, columbine, and the tower mustard, etc.");April 8, 1854 ("The columbine shows the most spring growth of any plant. ")

April 27 See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, April 27

Early saxifrage

one of the first flowers in

the spring – and  the world.

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, Early cliff dwellers

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 ©  2009-2024

All follow the sun.

April 23.

Vegetation starts when the earth's axis is sufficiently inclined; i.e. it follows the sun.

Insects and all the smaller animals (as well as many larger) follow vegetation.

The fishes, the small fry, start probably for this reason; worms come out of the trees; buffaloes finally seek new pastures; water-bugs appear on the water, etc., etc. 

Next, the large fish and fish hawks, etc., follow the small fry; flycatchers follow the insects and worms. Indians follow the buffaloes; trout, suckers, etc., follow the water-bugs, etc.; reptiles follow vegetation, insects, and worms; birds of prey, the flycatchers, etc. 

Man follows all, and all follow the sun.


H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 23, 1852

Vegetation starts when the earth's axis is sufficiently inclined . . . Man follows all, and all follow the sun. See September 13, 1852 ("How earnestly and rapidly each creature, each flower, is fulfilling its part while its day lasts! . . .As the planet in its orbit and around its axis, so do the seasons . . . The plant waits a whole year, and then blossoms the instant it is ready and the earth is ready for it, without the conception of delay.”); September 18, 1852("In the forenoons I move into a chamber on the east side of the house, and so follow the sun round.”); March 18, 1856 (“Two little water-bugs . . . here they are, in the first open and smooth water, governed by the altitude of the sun.”); April 24, 1854 ("The summer approaches by almost insensibly increasing lieferungs of heat, each awakening some new bird or quadruped or reptile. Each creature awaits with confidence its proper degree of heat"); April 26, 1854 ("The buds start, then the insects, then the birds."); See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Signs of the Spring: the new warmth of the sun; A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, As the Seasons Revolve
 

A Strange Dog

April 22.

It still rains. The water is over the road at Flint's Bridge, so that there is now only the Boston road open. This flood tempts men to build boats. The villagers walk the streets and talk of the great rise of waters.


A strange dog accompanies us today, a hunting dog, gyrating about us at a great distance, beating every bush and barking at the birds, with great speed, gyrating his tail too all the while. Our dog sends off a partridge with a whir, far across the open field and the river, like a winged bullet. This stranger dog has good habits for a companion, he keeps so distant. He never trusts himself near us, though he accompanies us for miles.

It takes this day to clear up gradually; successive sun-showers still make it foul. But the sun feels very warm after the storm. This makes five stormy days. Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday.

The water, slightly agitated, looks bright when the sun shines.

See four hawks soaring high in the heavens over the Swamp Bridge Brook. At first saw three; said to myself there must be four, and found the fourth.

From Cliffs see much snow on the mountains.

The pine on Lee's shore of the pond, seen against the light water this cloudy weather from part way down the Cliff, is an agreeable object to me. When the outline and texture of white pine is thus seen against the water or the sky, it is an affecting sight.

The shadow of the Cliff on Conantum in the semi-sunshine, with indistinct edge and a reddish tinge from bushes here and there!

What is that grass with a yellow blossom which I find now on the Cliff?

The early sedge (Carex marginata) grows on the side of the Cliffs in little tufts with small yellow blossoms, i. e. with yellow anthers, low in the grass.

I want things to be incredible, — too good to appear true. 

C. says, "After you have been to the post-office once you are damned!" But I answer that it depends somewhat on whether you get a letter or not. If you should not get a letter there is some hope for you.

If you would be wise, learn science and then forget it.

A boat on the river, on the white surface, looks black, and the boatman like Charon.

I see swarms of gnats in the air.
.
It is the contrast between sunshine and storm that is most pleasing; the gleams of sunshine in the midst of the storm are the most memorable.

It is pleasant sometimes looking thirty or forty rods into an open wood, where the trunks of the trees are plainly seen, and patches of soft light on the ground.

The maples in the side swamp near Well Meadow are arranged nearly in a circle in the water.

Saw that winkle-like fungus, fresh and green, covering an oak stump to-day with concentric marks, spirally arranged, sometimes in a circle, very handsome. I love this apparent exuberance of nature.
.
On the most retired, the wildest and craggiest,  most precipitous hillside you will find some old road by which the teamster carted off the wood.

The hylas peep now in full chorus, but are silent on my side of the pond.

The water at 6 P. M. is one and a half inches higher than in the morning , i.e. seven inches above the iron truss. 

The strain of the red-wing on the willow spray over the water to-night is liquid, bubbling, watery, almost like a tinkling fountain, in perfect harmony with the meadow. It oozes, trickles, tinkles, bubbles from his throat, -bob-y-lee-e-e, and then its shrill, fine whistle.

At 10 P. M. the northern lights are flashing, like some grain sown broadcast in the sky. 

I hear the hylas peep on the meadow as I stand at the door.

Mr. Holbrook tells me he heard and saw martins (?) yesterday. [Storm ends this evening.]

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 22, 1852

It still rains. The water is over the road at Flint's Bridge, so that there is now only the Boston road open. See April 22, 1856 (“These rain-storms -- this is the third day of one -- characterize 'the season, and belong rather to winter than to summer.”)

Our dog sends off a partridge with a whir, far across the open field and the river, like a winged bullet. See April 22,1859 (" Scare up partridges feeding about the green springy places under the edge of hills. See them skim or scale away for forty rods along and upward to the woods. . .dodging to right and left and avoiding the twigs, yet without once flapping the wings after having launched themselves.")See also December 14, 1855 ("They shoot off swift and steady, showing their dark-edged tails, almost like a cannon-ball. “)

The shadow of the Cliff on Conantum in the semi-sunshine, . . . See May 16, 1854 ("I notice the dark shadow of Conantum Cliff from the water. Why do I notice it at this season particularly? Is it because a shadow is more grateful to the sight now that warm weather has come? Or is there anything in the contrast between the rich green of the grass and the cool dark shade?”)

The early sedge (Carex marginata) grows on the side of the Cliffs in little tufts with small yellow blossoms, i. e. with yellow anthers, low in the grass. See  April 10, 1855 ('As for the early sedge, who would think of looking for a flower of any kind in those dry tufts whose withered blades almost entirely conceal the springing green ones? I patiently examined one tuft after another, higher and higher up the rocky hill, till at last I found one little yellow spike low in the grass which shed its pollen on my finger"):

The strain of the red-wing on the willow spray over the water to-night is liquid,,bubbling, watery, almost like a tinkling fountain,. . ., and then its shrill, fine whistle. See April 30, 1855 (" Red-wing blackbirds now fly in large flocks, covering the tops of trees—willows, maples, apples, or oaks—like a black fruit , and keep up an incessant gurgling and whistling, — all for some purpose; what is it?")  

See four hawks soaring high in the heavens. See April 22, 1860 ("See now hen-hawks, a pair, soaring high as for pleasure, circling ever further and further away, as if it were midsummer. The peculiar flight of a hawk thus fetches the year about. I do not see it soar in this serene and leisurely manner very early in the season, methinks. ")

When the outline and texture of white pine is thus seen against the water or the sky, it is an affecting sight. April 22, 1852 See April 24, 1853 ("See a pretty islet in the Creek Pond on the east side covered with white pine wood, appearing from the south as if the trees grew out of the water. . . .This gives the isle a peculiarly light and floating appearance.")
I see swarms of gnats in the air. See note to April 22, 1860 ("And in one place we disturb great clouds of the little fuzzy gnats that were resting on the bushes.")

The year is a circle

April 18.

The most interesting fact, perhaps, at present is these few tender yellow blossoms, these half-expanded sterile aments of the willow, seen through the rain and cold, — signs of the advancing year, pledges of the sun's return.

This is the spring of the year. Birds are migrating northward to their breeding-places; the melted snows are escaping to the sea. The river has far overflowed its channel. Most buds have expanded perceptibly, - show some greenness or yellowness. Universally Nature relaxes somewhat of her rigidity, yields to the influence of heat. Each day the grass springs and is greener.

I am serene and satisfied when the birds fly and the fishes swim as in fable, for the moral is not far off; when the migration of the goose is significant and has a moral to it; when the events of the day have a mythological character, and the most trivial is symbolical.

For the first time I perceive this spring that the year is a circle. I see distinctly the spring are thus far. It is drawn with a firm line. Every incident is a parable of the Great Teacher.

Why should just these sights and sounds accompany our life? Why should I hear the chattering of black-birds, why smell the skunk each year? I would fain explore the mysterious relation between myself and these things. I would at least know what these things unavoidably are, make a chart of our life, know how its shores trend, that butterflies reappear and when, know why just this circle of creatures completes the world.

Can I not by expectation affect the revolutions of nature, make a day to bring forth something new?

Observe all kinds of coincidences, as what kinds of birds come with what flowers. 

An east wind. I hear the clock strike plainly ten or eleven P.M.

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 18, 1852

These few tender yellow blossoms, these half-expanded sterile aments of the willow, seen through the rain and cold, — signs of the advancing year, pledges of the sun's return. See April 12, 1852 (" See the first blossoms (bright-yellow stamens or pistils) on the willow catkins to-day.. . . this earliest, perhaps swamp, willow with its bright-yellow blossoms on one side of the ament. It is fit that this almost earliest spring flower should be yellow, the color of the sun.")

This is the spring of the year. Each day the grass springs and is greener. See April 18, 1855 ("The hillside and especially low bank-sides are now conspicuously green"); April 25, 1859 ( "I got to-day and yesterday the first decided impression of greenness beginning to prevail")

The mysterious relation between myself and these things: See May 1850 ("It is as sweet a mystery to me as ever, what this world is"); November 21, 1850 ("What are these things?"); February 14, 1851 ("What are these things?"); September 7, 1851 ("We are surrounded by a rich and fertile mystery"); August 23, 1852 ("What are these rivers and hills, these hieroglyphics which my eyes behold?"); November 30, 1858 ("I want you to perceive the mystery of the bream"); November 22, 1860 ("And still nature is genial to man. Still he beholds the same inaccessible beauty around him.")

The year/something new: See September 24, 1859 (A man must attend to Nature closely for many years to know know what constitutes a year, that one year is like another, to anticipate her a little); May 5, 1860 ("It takes us many years to find out that Nature repeats herself annually.”) Also Walden ("To effect the quality of the day, that is the highest of arts.”)

A book of seasons: See June 11, 1851 (A book, each page written in its own season, out-of-doors, in its own locality.); August 24, 1852 ("The year is but a succession of days, and I see that I could assign some office to each day which, summed up, would be the history of the year.")

Why should just these sights and sounds accompany our life ,,, why just this circle of creatures completes this world? See Walden ("Why do precisely these objects which we behold make a world?"). See also   February 19, 1854:

Who placed us with eyes

between microscopic and 

telescopic world?

What kinds of birds come with what flowers. See April 15, 1854 ("The arrival of the purple finches appears to be coincident with the blossoming of the elm, on whose blossom it feeds. "); May 14, 1852 ("Ah! willow, willow! These willows have yellow bark, bear yellow flowers and yellowish-green leaves, and are now haunted by the summer yellowbird and Maryland yellow-throat.");See also A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Elms and the Purple Finch; A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Summer Yellowbird

An east wind. I hear the clock strike. See May 3, 1852 ("Evening.--The moon is full. . . I go along the side of Fair Haven Hill. The clock strikes distinctly, showing the wind is easterly. There is a grand, rich, musical echo trembling on the air long after the clock has ceased to strike. . . The vast, wild earth.") See also An east wind.

April 18, 2012

An east wind. I hear
the clock strike plainly ten
or eleven P.M.

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, The year is a circle

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 ©  2009-2024

tinyurl.com/hdt-520418

Which way the river runs.

April 16. 

I think our overflowing river far handsomer and more abounding in soft and beautiful contrasts than a merely broad river would be. A succession of bays it is, a chain of lakes, an endlessly scalloped shore, rounding wood and field. Cultivated field and wood and pasture and house are brought into ever new and unexpected positions and relations to the water. There is just stream enough for a flow of thought; that is all. 


Many a foreigner who has come to this town has worked for years on its banks without discovering which way the river runs.


H.D. Thoreau, Journal, April 16, 1852

A succession of bays it is, a chain of lakes. See April 7, 1853 (" he river is but a long chain of flooded meadows.") ); February 3, 1855 (“ It is all the way of one character, — a meadow river, or dead stream,—Musketicook,"); July 30, 1859 (“It is a mere string of lakes which have not made up their minds to be rivers.”)

Many a foreigner who has come to this town without discovering which way the river runs. See April 11, 1856 ("The current of the Assabet is so much swifter, and its channel so much steeper than that of the main stream, that, while a stranger frequently cannot tell which way the latter flows by his eye, you can perceive the declination of the channel of the former within a very short distance, even between one side of a tree and another. You perceive the waters heaped on the upper side of rocks and trees, and even twigs that trail in the stream.”)

April 16, 2012

The large-catkined early willow

April 15.

April 15, 2022

Rain, rain, rain, all day, carrying off the snow. 

The broad flat brown buds on Mr. Cheney's elm, containing twenty or thirty yellowish-green threads, surmounted with little brownish-mulberry cups, which contain the stamens and the two styles, -- these are just expanding or blossoming now. 

The aspen on the railroad is beginning to blossom, showing the purple or mulberry in the terminal catkins, though it droops like dead cats' tails in the rain. It appears about the same date with the elm.


I think that the largest early-catkined willow in large bushes in sand by water now blossoming -- the fertile catkins with paler blossoms, the sterile covered with pollen, a pleasant lively bright yellow -- is the brightest flower I have seen thus far. I notice that the sterile blossoms of that large-catkined early willow begin to open on the side of the catkin, like a tinge of golden light, gradually spreading and expanding over the whole surface and lifting their anthers far and wide. The stem of these sterile catkins is more reddish, smoother, and slenderer than that of the female ones (pale-flowered), which is darker and downy.


H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 15, 1852

The aspen on the railroad appears about the same date with the elm. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Aspens; also Elms and the Purple Finch.

I think that the largest early-catkined willow . . . is the brightest flower I have seen thus far. See April 12, 1852 (“It is fit that this almost earliest spring flower should be yellow, the color of the sun.”); April 18, 1852 ("The most interesting fact, perhaps, at present is these few tender yellow blossoms, these half-expanded sterile aments of the willow, seen through the rain and cold, — signs of the advancing year, pledges of the sun's return."); February 11, 1854 (“For how many aeons did the willow shed its yellow pollen annually before man was created!”)

cruel april

abraham lincoln shot in the back of the head,
jesus nailed to the cross,
the titanic sinks in an icy sea
and mother dies

time after time
every april when 

daffodils bloom 

in the garden


zphx 20120414

One or two pewees?

Sayornis phoebe

April 14.

I do not hear those peculiar tender die-away notes from the pewee yet. Is it another pewee, or a later note?

H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 14, 1852

See April 23, 1852 ("The wood pewee [?} on an elm sings now peer-r-weet peer-r-weet, peer-wee’. It is not the simple peer-r-wet peer-r-wee' that I heard at first. Will it not change next to that more tender strain?") 

Note: What we call the Phoebe (the first to arrive around April first) HDT calls the "pewee." In the later Journal he identifies as such the eastern wood pewee (which is the last species to arrive, usually around May 24th). Though few have ever lived more fully in the moment, the season of the phoebe is today hardly begun before HDT begins to live in anticipation of the note of the wood pewee five weeks hence, May 26th. See also May 22, 1854, May 24, 1859; May 24, 1860; May 24 2009 and A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Eastern Phoebe

A meadow and an island.

April 14.

On the Cliffs. 

If it were not for the snow it would be a remarkably pleasant, as well as warm, day.

It is now perfectly calm. The different parts of Fair Haven Pond -- the pond, the meadow beyond the button-bush and willow curve, the island, and the meadow between the island and mainland with its own defining lines -- are all parted off like the parts of a mirror. 

A fish hawk is calmly sailing over all, looking for his prey. 

I see the motions of a muskrat on the calm sunny surface a great way off. 

So perfectly calm and beautiful, and yet no man looking at it this morning but myself. 

It is pleasant to see the zephyrs strike the smooth surface of the pond from time to time, and a darker shade ripple over it.


The streams break up; the ice goes to the sea. Then sails the fish hawk overhead, looking for his prey.

***

The snow goes off fast, for I hear it melting and the eaves dripping all night as well as all day. 

I have been out every afternoon this past winter, as usual, in sun and wind, snow and rain, without being particularly tanned. This forenoon I walked in the woods and felt the heat reflected from the snow so sensibly in some parts of the cut on the railroad that I was reminded of those oppressive days two or three summers ago, when the laborers were obliged to work by night.  Well, since I have come home , this afternoon and evening, I find that I am suddenly tanned, even to making the skin of my nose sore.

The sun, reflected thus from snow in April, perhaps especially in the forenoon, possesses a tanning power.


H. D. Thoreau, Journal, April 14, 1852

The different parts of Fair Haven Pond are all parted off like the parts of a mirror. See November 20, 1850 ("I saw Fair Haven Pond with its island, and meadow between the island and the shore, and a strip of perfectly still and smooth water in the lee of the island, and two hawks, fish hawks perhaps, sailing over it"). See also April 14, 1855 ("The waters, too, are smooth and full of reflections.")

A fish hawk is calmly sailing over all, looking for his prey. See April 14, 1856 ("See from my window a fish hawk flying high west of the house,. . .he suddenly wheels and, straightening out his long narrow wings, makes one circle high above the last meadow, as if he had caught a glimpse of a fish beneath, and then continues his course down the river.") See also April 6, 1859 ("A fish hawk sails down the river, from time to time almost stationary one hundred feet above the water, notwithstanding the very strong wind."); April 7, 1859 ("The fish hawk which you see soaring and sailing so leisurely about over the land — for this one soared quite high into the sky at one time — may have a fish in his talons all the while and only be waiting till you are gone for an opportunity to eat it on his accustomed perch.") and A Book of Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Osprey (Fish Hawk)

April 14. See A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, April 14.

Ice goes to the sea.

The fish hawk sails overhead

looking for his prey.

A Book of the Seasons,  by Henry Thoreau, A Meadow and an Island

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 ©  2009-2024

https://tinyurl.com/hdt-520414