pregnant trees amidst blizzard (or maybe it is only snowing)

maybe except the birds, there is hardly anything fascinates me more than trees. their magnanimity. their patience. how they treat the birds. their quiet, but distinctive voices, different each season. trees never bore me. i can walk among them, talking and listening to them almost endlessly.

a few days ago i noticed that the faster trees looked .. pregnant. there was something definitely thicker, redder and .. more about the branches extended towards the pale grey skies. and then i thought, if they did not mind, i’d like to take a few photos, for memory. today i asked. they did not.

unfortunately the falling snow made it quite impossible to use my camera, and i used the nokia camera instead. and here’s the irony – the snow thinks itis winter, but the voices of the trees know and sing the advent of the next season. the snow can fool nobody, not in the tree department.

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another conjunction

even if

living here, one is supposed to be proud of the winters with their cold and snow and blizzards and ice and whatnot, and sort of look down on the ‘southern softies’,

i sometimes think that a more temperate climate would be an advantage.

i am bored by monochrome.

i want daffodils.

but the only green-yellows i see are the tom-tits at the bird feeder. they do not lack in beauty or courage, of course. but their presence by my window only confirms the absolute rule of winter.

and just like i wished for snow in the dark side of the year, i long for the smell of melting earth, of the first grass blades, the change of pitch in the twitter of birds.

even if this spring is time i do not want to live through.

summarily a-b-c

tomorrow january will be over. so, this far:

A) the Term paper presentations went reasonably well. part because my head of department clean forgot the invitation (i do think she missed loads of fun), and so the atmosphere was quite informal, yet shot with academic trends;
part because i have the best students in the world among the term paper writers. smart. ingenious. creative. unusual. well-read. able to play. able to see things. cool people, really. where else one could get a spontaneous discussion of orc colours or vampire wardrobe preferences amidst stylistics and other discourse things? i think i am proud of my students, generally and particularly.

B) some unknown maledictor (or maybe malefactor, too) has managed to deprive me of all left hand gloves. really. yesterday morning (it being 15 below zero) i found myself in possession of no fewer than 5 right hand gloves, and no left hand gloves were to be found anywhere in my room. if this is not weird, what is?

the little cat is probably stealing chocolate

for the fans of winter roads

them outside my window

a swish of soot-black,
a flash of bright yellow,
a song of explosive laugher…
blackbird in snow.

lucidity

there is just one day every winter, when the second snow comes.

on that day, the sky is white, the ground is white, and the branches are white.

and the wide world suddenly is limpid, lucid, transparent.

only the dark undersides of the branches point us upwards.

buried

under mountains of test papers, i
make a tiny little cave  for
unexpected survival in a world
full of too many words

and too many sorrows