The Apostrophe Blog
The clocks do their foolishness also known as moving one hour ahead tonight. This late winter in the Pacific Northwest has been unseasonably cold; the first daffodil in our garden—opened today—is usually parading its yellow trumpet many weeks earlier than this. We walked to the public library outpost at the University of Oregon/Portland outpost six or so blocks from our house earlier this afternoon. Wind, sun, wind, clouds. March was marching onward and along and then some.
Tomorrow I will wake early, tune into the video recording of a poetry craft class that was originally broadcast via Zoom on Friday morn. There will be blank pages of paper, an uncapped pen, notes scribbled about juxtapositions, the theme of the class this week. Later in the day, the Academy Awards will be on the television set. My ritual every year is to watch them attentively, even reverently, but ever careful to mute any and all ads. These days there are so few award surprises it can edge into almost boring but for the gowns and the occasional inspirational acceptance speech or three. At this point, I am mostly rooting for the art form to survive the vagaries of this too-much-digital age intact. On this day that is all about springing ahead. Bounding, hopping, galloping, leaping, jumping, vaulting, kicking back. Coming into being. Shooting up. Relating to the vernal, the season of spring. Verb as well as noun.
Spring from the Old English spring (noun), springan (verb), of Germanic origin; related to Dutch and German springen. Early use in the senses ‘head of a well’ and ‘rush out in a stream’ gave rise to the figurative use ‘originate’.
As Emily Dickinson opined:
A Light exists in Spring
Not present on the Year
At any other period –
When March is scarcely here
A Color stands abroad
On Solitary Fields
That Science cannot overtake
But Human Nature feels.
It waits upon the Lawn,
It shows the furthest Tree
Upon the furthest Slope you know
It almost speaks to you.
Then as Horizons step
Or Noons report away
Without the Formula of sound
It passes and we stay –
A quality of loss
Affecting our Content
As Trade had suddenly encroached
Upon a Sacrament.
Interests: Reading, writing, not arithmetic. The art and craft of poetry. Photography. Vegetable and flower gardening especially heirloom bulbs and dahlias. Movies in real theatres. Theatre on real stages. Art in real galleries. Crossword puzzles and, of course, Wordle. Singer-songwriters like Aimee Mann and Patti Griffin. All kinds of music especially 1930s jazz. Venice, Italy! The Dude abides.
- Publication News: Petals in the Pan Anthology - April 27, 2024
- Book Review: The Art of Voice by Tony Hoagland - April 19, 2024
- Here Comes the Sun! - April 15, 2024
