January 21, 2013

Well, it's an afternoon note today.  Just got distracted this morning, and it slipped my mind until now, and I actually had something interesting to talk about today.  This morning there was a great blue heron in the yard, right at the end of the driveway.  I saw it as it became light, the sky the blue ash color just before it gets to be daylight.  It was foggy and the heron sort of appeared there, kind of like a weird magic trick.  It did nothing for the longest time, just stood there on its improbably long stilts and bobbed its head.  This was one of the biggest I have seen, easily 4 feet tall, perhaps taller, I have a hard time estimating height, but it was only a couple of feet from Mikayla's car and it looked like its head was just a little shorter than the car and it was farther away.  I watched it to see what further magic it might perform, and I was not disappointed.  When I looked down at the keyboard for a moment, it was gone when I looked back.  I did not see if it walked away or flew, it had just vanished.   For some reason, the large birds like the herons, egrets, cranes, the ones with long stilty legs, they are just so fascinating!  They are improbable, elegant, and amazing, and continue to be so no matter how often I see them or how long we have lived here where at least the herons and egrets are pretty common.

When we went out this afternoon to go to the movies, I realized it is spring, and my maple tree has the right of it.  Dandelions had gone to seed in the median by the park, making their white alien puff balls in long bare gray stalks.   And when we went past the bank, the temperature sign said 77.  And it's January!  At least that's what the calendar would have us believe!  I will be glad if we have a long, long mild spring!

Looking for a poem today, I found a new magazine, Orion Magazine, that has poetry and deals with environmental issues as well.  A lot of their poems are nature oriented or seasonal.  They actually had one about . . .

The Blue

heron is gray, not blue, but great enough

against brown-tipped bowed cattails to be

well-named, is known for its stealth, shier

than a cloud, but won't fly or float away

when it's scared, stands there thinking maybe

it's invisible though it's not—tall, gray,

straight as a pole among the cloudy reeds.

 

Then it picks up one stem leg. This takes time.

And sets it down just beyond the other,

no splash, breath of a ripple, goes on

slowly across the silt, mud, algae-

throttled surface, through sedge grass,

to stand to its knees in water turning

grayer now that afternoon is evening. 

Now that afternoon is evening

the gray heron turns blue, bluer than sky,

bluer than the mercury blue-black still pond.

So when did it snag the bullfrog

hanging, kicking, in its scissor beak?

To look so long means to miss the sudden.

It strides around like a sleek cat

 

from pond to bank and back, blue tall bird,

washing the frog, banging it against stones,

pecking almost as if it doesn't know

what to do now that it's caught such a thing.

How fast its beak must be to shoot out

like an arrow or that certain—as it's called—

slant of light. Blue light. Where did it go? 

David Baker

I will agree that the great blue heron is more gray than blue and I have seen them move with their careful balanced gait.  The backward knees always seem so . . . odd, but then no odder than the rest of the bird.  And I have seen them catch fish, and they are definitely fast, a blur of beak and feathers, then a lot of swallowing with their head tipped to the sky.  The last line is so perfect for what happened this morning, "Where did it go?"  I don't know but I like to think it just dissolved with the fog and perhaps will return with it some other morning.