In the Weeds

If I hadn't seen the two undergrads casting on the opposite bank, I'd not have walked around; and if I hadn't walked around, I'd not have seen their path through the tall grasses and weeds; and if I hadn't seen their path, I'd not have been brave enough to get close.

To them I owe my thanks, and to this Slaty Skimmer for returning again and again to cardinal flowers very nearly in reach.

(I just hope I don't wake in the middle of the night to chigger bumps.)

Let Me Count the Ways

Dear Sue,

You're right: Cheston can be annoying in the same way a crowded state fair is -- loud, teeming with cursing and splashing children (in this case four boys who systematically caught and squeezed newts and then threw them like trash in the water), country music, pontificating adults carrying on the same irritating conversation we've both heard before, parents ignoring their children while sunning themselves well away from the water (periodically also cursing at said children), and a whole gaggle (30 at least) of young boys led by a Sewanee student who gathered them on the dam long enough for a picture and then clomped up to the picnic pavilion. Not only that, but I discovered that some bozo weed-ate clumps of the blackberry bushes along the run-off between dam and bridge. Why? And why so many loud, obnoxious, thoughtless people?

Your friend,
Robley

PS Lest I forget, I should name three good things: a chance encounter with painter and alum Claude Buckley (www.claudebuckley.comhttp://www.claudebuckley.com/aboutus.html#.VZ7kvPlVhHw) and former resident of JB's "cave" on South Carolina; deep purple blackberries bursting with juicy flavor and red ones ripening; and the first Halloween Pennant I've seen this summer.

PPS Parts of the lake are indeed silty, and it takes no scientist to know why: I watched four boys jump in, walk around, and generally roil up the lake bottom.

please note the color of the water

PPPS Remind me as I did you: go early or late.

Holy Cow!

What a difference a telezoom makes! In only twenty minutes before a storm, I can see that my Odonate life is changing. What a difference distance can make.

 Thanks to my friends CP and WS for pushing me to do it.




Welcome, Lumix!

Blues on Parade

Slaty Skimmer and Sky Water

Old Female Slaty Skimmer

Male Southern Spreadwing

Double-ringed Pennant

Male Amber-winged Spreadwing and Sky Water

Blue Dasher

Five Years and Counting

Five years.

1,748 published posts.

1,503 page views last month.

36,205 all time history page views.

These are a few of my blog's stats.

Some writers care about their stats, but I don't. Why? Because they say nothing important about my blog and my reasons for blogging.

What matters is this: I enjoy anticipating writing a post, spending the day attending to what happens; selecting a focus; exploring that topic; preparing the "snap," whether my own image or something I've borrowed (like a book cover); and then drafting, revising, editing, and publishing my work.

This blog is about what preoccupies me, not what might interest you, Dear Reader (if you are reading, then you are automatically "dear" to me).

Today, that interest is blue. Glorious blue. Blue sky, which we haven't seen in Sewanee in a long, long time. Blue Dasher, the abdomen a dusty hyacinth like the Crane stationery I once used for formal notes. The green-blue of the male Pondhawk, taking on his adult hue. The Slaty Skimmer's deep blue of a star-lit night, and the electric turquoise of a skink slung out on warm concrete.

Oh blue, how I have missed you.

Oh blog, how I have enjoyed you.

Here's to more of both for years to come.

Elegy

For the Slaty Skimmer

Strung on silk,

Libellula incesta,

you hang

as from a cross

wings out

spread but still.

Dancer of air,

wearing blue

like a tuxedo,

you once perched,

patrolled, hovered,

pivoted and spun

round challengers,

balletic wrestlers

in a theatrical show.

Now in spider’s

embrace, your

color blanching,

you startle still:

your veined wings

shimmering

holy light.

Nostalgia

Yesterday a flock of ducks flapped and slapped water, lifting aloft, circling back, skiing across water before lifting again, angling from dam toward beach. 

Today, an older Slaty Skimmer, wings chewed away like worried cuticles, sunned on sumac leaves, reddened with coming fall.

Such beauty, arriving and leaving, fills me with longing, like leave-taking of loved ones: joy and sorrow, sorrow and joy.

Traffic Jam

Where water pours into Lake Cheston from the woods, I stood on the small wooden bridge.  The Common Green Darner jetted up and down and around the shore, weaving in and out of the cattails, now speeding faster than I could watch, then stopping in mid-air like a basketball pro on the court.  The little red Calico Pennant balanced on the tip of a grass spear, idle.  The Banded Pennants snapped to and mated; the Eastern Amberwings hovered over the water, patrolling their tiny kingdoms with calm aplomb.  Slaty Skimmers flew one above the other, turning and turning till one sped off and the other followed.  Widow Skimmers spun into the sky like runaway pinwheels.  Clinging to the lower stems and grasses, a single Bluet hung out and paired Swamp Spreadwings and Violet Dancers completed their couplings.  Finally, into the mix came the yoked Black Saddlebags flying clumsily as if tipsy, he dipping and she refusing to deposit her eggs, others in hot pursuit.



At noon, here, imagine this: rush-hour traffic in a big city, to the sound of fish-slapping water, flicking wings, and birdsong.  Always, let there be birdsong.