A little study of light and shadow and observation. Colors that create shape. A horse that carries story.

And this little Say's Phoebe. This mighty little bird.

They were here last year, the Phoebes, building a nest in my porch, the female leaving her nest every time I went out my door, until I finally stopped using the front door so as to not disturb her.

Such is the way that I can live when I have deer and birds and foxes as neighbors.

The little nestlings sitting like mummies in their home. Small relics, their big, black eyes staring, fooling me into thinking that they were, perhaps, not alive.

And then, random moves. Change. Small shifts. Just enough to begin a story.

Same as the paint. As line, curving and changing.

And what was not a life,
Not a beginning,
Just a color,

Became a story.
A flight. 
A friendship.

And when the birds left their nest, as they do, they lived in my little decripit courtyard,
learning to fly and find food,
calling to their mom as she brought them insects,
and alighting on my open windows and singing.

So little, so quiet, but if you look and listen, you will see them.

*And, if you're curious, they are back again, in the same nest, refreshed for this spring with new grass and horse hair, with five little eggs this year. And, once again, the front door is off limits until they fly.

Fire and bluebirds,
Fissures and roots,
Ground and flight.

Forests grow both from seeds and decay. Mountains push skyward as gravity and erosion tumble their stones. Rivers scour and deliver.

Both can be. 

Have you ever

Let the expansiveness of place and time fill your soul?
Let the wild flood your self and find solace in the space around?
Let the enormous world seep into your very being?

I am so very fortunate to live where the winds and snows can blow unobstructed by buildings and cars and whirls only through pines and over sandstone cliffs. I would like to think, though, that this space lives in us all, a calmness and truth brought to us by the promise of nature. A peace of solemnity. 

It's like when
you're walking in the Spring,
and your feet brush past the dried winter grasses
and sink into leftover remnants of snow patches
and then you spot
Yellowbells
and hear the first lyrics of the 
Meadowlarks
​and the promise of new life.

Raze.
To completely destroy, demolish; to break into pieces.

Raise.
To lift, set upright, cultivate.

Must you have one to have another?

When the pieces in us can be as straight and as clearcut as geometric lines, void of shape and texture and offering searingly crisp answers, and can yet be transformed to flight and hope and strength. 

And then, when, the pieces can look at the other.

​And see in each other a recognition. 

When the winter cold finally eases,
and the sun promises to warm and relax you;
when the yellowed grasses from the previous year still stand tall
as they slowly give way to the new growth,
And you can lie fully in the light.

I'm enthralled with the duality of things, with the multiple realities of a singular experience or story. To fully appreciate an essence, one must also have the other. 
The icingly white snow gives way to the blistering sun, which, in turn, eventually gives way to the snow again.
The copper mare, strong in her will must lie down, this rest and vulnerability fueling her strength.
​