FROST...

AN OLD MAN'S WINTER NIGHT (Robert Frost 1874-1963) excerpts

All out of doors looked darkly in at him through the thin frost, 

 almost in separate stars, that gathers on the pane in empty rooms.

What kept his eyes from giving back the gaze 

was the lamp tilted near them in his hand.

And scared the outer night, which has its sounds, familiar, like the roar of trees and crack of branches...

common things.........

Where now he sat, concerned with what he knew what,

A quiet light, and then not even that.

He consigned to the moon, such as she was,

So late-arising, to the broken moon

As better than the sun in any case

For such a charge, his snow upon the roof,

His icicles along the wall to keep;

And slept. The log that shifted with a jolt

Once in the stove, disturbed him and he shifted, and eased his heavy breathing,

but still slept.

One aged man--one man---can't keep a house, a farm, a countryside,

it's thus he does it of a winter night.

Photographs 2026 "An Old Man's Winter Night" first published in 1916 

(Mountain Interval collection) by Robert Frost is in the public domain
 

SHE is WINTER

A WINTER's TALE by D.H. Lawrence (1885-1930)

Yesterday, the fields were only grey with scattered snow

And now the longest grass-leaves hardly emerge:

Yet her deep footsteps mark the snow, and go

On towards the pines at the hills' white verge.....

I cannot see her, since the mist's white scarf

Obscures the dark wood and the dull orange sky;

But she's waiting, I know, impatient and cold, half

Sobs struggling into her frosty sigh.....

Why does she come so promptly, when she must know

                                        
That she's only the nearer to the inevitable farewell;

The hill is steep, on the snow my steps are slow.....

Why does she come......

                  When she knows.......

                                                                 What I have to tell?

Photographs 2025   D.H. Lawrence was an English novelist, wrote on travel,  plays, painter  amongst other creative endeavors. He died of tuberculosis, on March 30 1930...there were over 60,000 deaths in  France, and over 50,000 in the UK, that same year.

 

At the Window

 "People ask me what I do in winter when there's no baseball. I stare out the window and wait for spring..." 
        -Rogers Hornsby (1896-1963) (Baseball infielder. 23 seasons in major leagues)

 Ah well........our indoor  cats stare outside, at the outdoor cats. Winter. Spring. Summer. Fall. Especially winter. Especially now. The winter that will never end.  Rain forest winter that drips with snow and hail, like it has a perpetual runny nose....

 The mountains are  shrouded, slimed with fog goobers.  I  Fiddle and faddle with my seed pods. All in little rows  all bubbling along nicely. waiting for  the moment when something green will pop forth.Watching the Cats watch me.

 And the indoor cats. When not at the window,they know FIRE. Especially the oldest one; 17 and warming her fluff day in and day out. A very happy Bo.Even when the hail beats against the window. It sounds like rattling teeth being tossed around by giants. Giant cats.

 Outdoor cats, like Cordelia, sit in perfection, watching  Hummers hum circles around the others. I play with the pods. Willing them to grow. Spraying them with a spray bottle. Looking  out the window....Snow in the clouds. 

  Hummers  dive bomb the cats on the porch. And then dive bomb their feeders.

 I think to myself that I should have been crafty enough to make pods out of newspaper. Newspaper. ......who has  time to do that? I've never been that anxious to be  keen enough to fold up newspaper into little pots. Though it WOULD give me  something to do,while watching another  cat climb across the grape arbour. 

 He swishes his tail.....Frost flicks off  the branches with every swish.

 Then he inches forwards on the grape vines....

 Then looks at ME. We lock eyes.Through the big window.....He wins.

 "I discovered windows one afternoon, and after that, nothing was ever the same." -Anne Spollen, The Shape of Water.

 " A window covered with raindrops interests me more than a photograph of a famous person...."
                            -Saul Leiter (1923-2013) ( American Photographer)

 "Birds  were created to record everything.They were not designed to just be beautiful jewels in the sky, but to serve as the eyes of heaven...." 
      -Suzy Kassem (1975-)Rise up and Salute the Sun: The writings  of Suzy Kassem.

 I wonder if any of the seed pods will sprout. Some of them were annoying to stuff into the pods. Fiddly things. Maybe  winter  will  dissolve  soon. I should turn over the compost again. Scrape out worms. Give the robins a thrill. 

   In the meantime, I will keep an eye on the window. It's winter still. Soggy. Snowy. Hail. Cats. Cats everywhere. Rain. Snow........Soon it will be spring. I'll remain plastered at the window......I've been assured that it won't last........The cats are congregating. That's a sign.....

 "I feel that it is healthier to  look out at the world thru a window , rather than a mirror. Otherwise, all you see is yourself, and whatever is behind you...." -Bill Withers  (1938-)(Singer//Songwriter)

 Photographs 2017: M . McConachie Woods