December 4, 2012

Very dark out for a long time as there is fog this morning, and, now that the fog is lifting, light just seeps in quietly, no dawn coming up like thunder this morning, though we may be in for thunder later.  The sky is a washed out blue, more white than blue yet you can tell the blue is out there somewhere waiting to sneak in.  The air is still, not a breath stirring which is keeping the fog close to the ground.  Fog makes everything look strange, some things look farther away and some blurred but closer.  Earlier I heard the ships fog horns but now they are silent, as are the birds.  Fog does seem to have a dampening, yes pun intended, effect on the bird song, I'm not sure why.  Usually by this time the morning chorus is just about done, today it's been a very quiet chorus, a mourning dove, and very early a mockingbird trying out a soft run of song near the window.

The sawtooth oak that usually keeps most of its dry brown leaves through the winter is letting them fall now; they curl up at the edges like dampened paper, a drift of pages from some antique book whose pages were not made of sterner stuff.  I suppose with all the weather in the low 80s lately the trees may be confused.  The maple tree still has 90% of its leaves, a thinner green going gold at the top, but still mostly green.  It's the first week in December, most places are done with fall now, their leaves gone till spring.  I'd say we might just now be heading into full fall, maybe.  The ash trees started turning their clear bright yellow this week.  By the time we have fall, it will be spring again, and we will have skipped winter altogether.

The day seems to be getting . . . dimmer, the blue further away, the sky blank and expectant, something will be written there, perhaps rain.  I found a poem about fog that is full of lush words, and startling views.

Fog   

A vagueness comes over everything,

as though proving color and contour

alike dispensable: the lighthouse

extinct, the islands' spruce-tips

drunk up like milk in the

universal emulsion; houses

reverting into the lost

and forgotten; granite

subsumed, a rumor

in a mumble of ocean.

                      Tactile

definition, however, has not been

totally banished: hanging

tassel by tassel, panicled

foxtail and needlegrass,

dropseed, furred hawkweed,

and last season's rose-hips

are vested in silenced

chimes of the finest,

clearest sea-crystal.

                       Opacity

opens up rooms, a showcase

for the hueless moonflower

corolla, as Georgia

O'Keefe might have seen it,

of foghorns; the nodding

campanula of bell buoys;

the ticking, linear

filigree of bird voices.

Amy Clampitt

It's amazing to me how a little water vapor can rob things of their usual vibrant color, everything fades.  The leaves are sifting down one by one, and it looks like the fog is thickening, perhaps it is just the growing clouds descending making it dimmer instead of lighter.  Here I am missing the "ticking, linear filigree of bird voices", everything is too quiet, and just now a little wind begins.  Perhaps the "universal emulsion" will grow thicker, enough to rain later, for which we will all be grateful.

Now it's time to go and do things.  It's the season of lots of things to do, I hope everyone today does something they enjoy, or enjoys something they need to do.  More joy is always a good thing!