Daily Meditation, day 15

March 17, 2009 6:09

(keep in mind that I only give myself ten minutes to write an observation… it’s what I can come up with for a poem that quickly)

 

Ground strewn with broken branches,

winter ice scars linger.

Grey birch tops down,

suckers reach skyward like new fingers

rising from mud, grass…

sleepy skunk awoken,

digs beneath moss

 

 

 

Daily Meditation, day 14

March 16, 2009 5:44 PM

 

Cedar splits in two

Dry leaf scrapes pavement…

Winter chilled wind

 

Daily Meditation, day 13

An old apple tree lost to an ice storm

This afternoon, curious about my impression of the same place in daylight versus darkness, I sat in about the same spot that I did last night.  Once again, I am surprised at my auditory response to the landscape – I feel like I am seeing the forest with my ears. Once I become still, settle my mind, I begin to hear.  The layers peel back.  Beneath the breeze wisping my ears and teasing trees, I hear a small airplane. Then I hear the chickadees. A redwing blackbird.  A mourning dove joins the chorus.  A chain saw. There, a nuthatch and cardinal.  I keep listening. Beneath the birds, wood frogs in the vernal pool and children across the street chime in, rounding out my sense of place.

 

Daily Meditation, day 12

March 13, 2009 8:11 PM

 

It was dark and cold out tonight when I walked out back to look up at the stars.    I was surprised by the difference from my daytime observations – not so much for the obvious darkness, but by both the quiet and the unquiet.  There is a certain stillness to the night. No animals moved in my vicinity (it is early March after all). The ever-present breeze that creates a background white noise to my ears was as absent as the sun.  In this quiet, I could hear more, but in a way, I could hear less, too.  There were no trucks working in the background, no deliverymen making rounds, but there were people home in all of the surrounding houses.  There were more cars going in and out of driveways than I would have ever guessed possible.  I don’t hear these things in the day, but in the quiet of night, it’s all I could hear.  I could hear the undertone of quiet just beneath these cars, but I couldn’t quite get at it.  I stared at the sky and appreciated just how quiet my neighborhood is during the daytime. The singing metal bridge seemed so much louder now, too, as the occasional car passed over it. 

 

Through the leaveless forest buffering my property from the neighborhood, I could see countless twinkling stars.  I could see Orion to the southwest and televisions flickering to the southeast.  There seem to be more houses around than I notice during the day, when the cool blue of terrestrial stars cannot pierce the brightness of my solitude.

 

Daily Meditation, day 11

March 12, 2009 6:45

 

I lost track of time this afternoon, only remembering my daily meditation as the sun threatened to dip below the horizon.  I sat on a couch of grass, planted in the yard last summer, and considered the promise of spring to come.  A constant breeze gives me a chill; it is cold enough to need a good hat. Already much of the snow has melted, but creating indiscernible patterns that make me wonder why it has melted from beneath one tree, but not another?  Where I sit, the grass is fully revealed as a dirty, gray shag carpet. Individual blades reveal a mixture of black, brown, yellow and pale green.  Green!  There is hope that this moment of gray bleakness will move on, like the snow that blanketed this couch all through the long winter sleep. 

 

I find myself drawn to the phragmites, rustling in the wind, seemingly agitating for spring as well.  Wisps of clouds move quickly. A chime at the house reminds me to light the woodstove.

 

Daily Meditation, day 10

March 11, 2009 5:05

 

I stared up into the misty, gray sky.

I stared up into the featureless, gray sky.

I stared up into the bleak, gray sky.

I stared up into the cool, gray sky.

I stared up into the still, gray sky.

I stared up into the vast, gray sky.

I stared up into the dense, gray sky.

I stared up into the vacant, gray sky.

I stared up into the thick, gray sky.

I stared up into the gray sky.

 

Daily Meditation, day 9

March 10, 2009 1:50

 

wave rolls over

crashing left to right —

shells crunch

 

Daily Meditation, day 8

March 9, 2009 5:25

I stand in ankle-deep snow looking at the branches of a peach tree in my yard.  This late winter snow hides whether the tree feels spring is coming or not.  It is a warm, wet snow that sticks.  Phragmites are dragged to the ground, tree branches form criss-crosses of white.  Yesterday, I thought spring was here for certain.  Today my feet are cold.  With my mind, I attempt to force buds and leaves, then soft, velvety peaches to form.

 

 

Daily Meditation, day 7

March 8, 2009 1:10

 

Today, my meditation takes place where I am: downtown Portsmouth.  I sit on the sidewalk enjoying the 50’s warm air and clear sun.  I examine a maple tree planted in the walkway.  Its buds are turning red and I begin to believe spring is here.  I watch people walk by and enjoy being downtown, out of my normal studio seclusion.  The wind flaps a piece of yellow construction tape tied next to where I sit.  I wonder what this unknown construction will bring. 

 

Daily Meditation, day 6

March 7, 2009 4:28

 

I walked into the woods searching for the perfect spot to observe.  The air was cooler in patches where water pooled and braches overhung.  I stopped at a small pond of slush that will likely become a vernal pool once the snow is gone.  There were two agitated squirrels squawking so much and so loud that I hadn’t noticed the sound of the distant highway until they made up and became friends again. Now I hear an airplane and a helicopter.  Not until then did I understand what I was looking for as I stumbled through the snow looking for a place to stop: a place that didn’t reflect human disturbance, something that appeared natural and wild, in a region entirely touched by human hands.  I walked deep into the forest from the road to banish power lines from sight or cars from hearing.  With the sounds of the plane piercing my silence, I resent the intrusion.  I want to walk into nature and shed machines and reminders of modernity and just be, if only for a moment.  Around this pool, I begin to discern fluorescent marking tape on trees surrounding the pool.  I have no idea what it means.