This beautiful poem was published in the VictoriaTimes Colonist last Christmas season. I tried to track down the author but had no luck. It makes me feel such a sense of place. Although it appears to have been written about Vancouver Island, I feel the same way as I walk through the Columbia Valley winter landscape.
Clock of the Wind
I follow the path to the winter stream,
past the confetti of huckleberry leaves
to pick maple leaves caught in the sword ferns,
to keep the David Austin roses warm.
It's nearly Solstice.
I follow the water's sound,
the tree branch sound,
listen to the clock of the wind
winding through the hemlocks.
I'm bound to this place
like the small dark birds
I can't name
who have found their home
in the crowned branches of the salmonberries.
I listen for their heatbeats. Their wingbeats.
And these dark days,
when the sun stands still,
I want to hang broken mirrors, small clocks
and castanets from the apple trees.
Dance.
Bring back the light.
I was trying to do some bighorn sheep paintings but this just didn't turn out. The ram was itching his shoulder with his horn but it doesn't seem to come across in the painting. The twisty design element looks like a tapeworm and there is no corelation between the sheep and the background. I'm thinking paint-over.
