Tuesday, March 08, 2022

Poem for Tuesday and Arboretum Trees

Burren, Co. Clare
By Rhoda Coghill

Here have I drifted on a quiet wave
Of happening, that gently washes
Where Time's slow-flowing ocean flood has shaped
Age-old valley and hill.
Its waters, lapping still
About me in imagination, have
Confused my sense: so birds like fishes
Swim in the liquid air, and lichened bushes
Have turned to branching coral: sheep on the mountain-side
To flecks of foam left by an ebbing tide.
Forgotten, solitary,
The casual flotsam of an epoch I,
Where crumbling mortuary mounds
Of ancient men are found,
Who lie, long buried, leagues below
The cyclic ebb and flow
Of Time's refashioning,—drowned
Beneath slow tide on tide of history.

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Monday was nearly as warm as Sunday, though we had periods of rain and the most recent one is dropping the temperature quickly. We took a long walk in between showers and in between various work and chores -- laundry is half-done, scanning project about the same (today included cards from our wedding and when older son was born, plus I got to talk to a good friend from college because I sent him some of his letters after I scanned them and he called me, which was awesome). 

After dinner we watched the first of a two-part documentary about County Clare, The Burren: Heart of Stone, on PBS, which was excellent, then we watched this week's Snowpiercer, which was a nice change of pace in terms of scenery and character interactions and had a very promising ending, and The Endgame, which will do one thing clever but then have dialogue so unrealistic that it's really annoying. Here are some of the flowering plum trees currently at the National Arboretum: 

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