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Winter garden
Jan. 16th, 2007 03:26 pmAwoke this morning to a quiet dawn all feathered with white, powder-sugar piling up on the deck, making the cat hesistate on the sill and require a bit of a gentle boot to the rear to go out. Tip-toed into the kids rooms, whispering them awake with "Look out the window...", leaving them to their sleepy surprise and delight at the newly wintered world.
They slept on after for a time, snuggled into warm blankets. I donned my boots and coat, scattering cracked corn under the shelter of the firs for the little fun-n-feather ones, listened to the soft silence of a traffic-less sunrise punctuated only with the high shrieks of children somewhere nearby, sliding with delight on what had suddenly become a holiday. My rose hangs its head under a cap of white, petals browned by the cold, a robin sits within her thorny shelter and watches me.
( The latch on the greenhouse door ) bears a little mound of perfect crystal snow that I am loath to disturb; the door edge trails over the drift in a perfect semicircle, a snow-angel wing. The tiny heater has been doing its work, and the air is milder. Inside, my plant-children huddle together on their wooden beds - there is ice in their watering-can, but ( one pink geranium ) manages to gently nod with a single winter bloom. The others look out at the snow piling upon the glass and sigh for spring, grateful that they aren't out there with the barren, browned grapevines. I stand with them for a while, watching the silent snow, I touch them, stroking away the dead leaves, and reassured they are comfortable reluctantly turn to go.
( A pair of feline eyes ) watch me from the top of the woodshed, hoping to make a dash into that inner sanctum. She knows it is warm in there, she loves to sleep among the plants in the sunshine, but not today... I close the door and we go back together, up the snowy path among the silvered firs and ferns, me huddled in my coat and well-content, her with her fur fluffed wide, bounding for the cover of the eaves.
Snow day. A good morning.
They slept on after for a time, snuggled into warm blankets. I donned my boots and coat, scattering cracked corn under the shelter of the firs for the little fun-n-feather ones, listened to the soft silence of a traffic-less sunrise punctuated only with the high shrieks of children somewhere nearby, sliding with delight on what had suddenly become a holiday. My rose hangs its head under a cap of white, petals browned by the cold, a robin sits within her thorny shelter and watches me.
( The latch on the greenhouse door ) bears a little mound of perfect crystal snow that I am loath to disturb; the door edge trails over the drift in a perfect semicircle, a snow-angel wing. The tiny heater has been doing its work, and the air is milder. Inside, my plant-children huddle together on their wooden beds - there is ice in their watering-can, but ( one pink geranium ) manages to gently nod with a single winter bloom. The others look out at the snow piling upon the glass and sigh for spring, grateful that they aren't out there with the barren, browned grapevines. I stand with them for a while, watching the silent snow, I touch them, stroking away the dead leaves, and reassured they are comfortable reluctantly turn to go.
( A pair of feline eyes ) watch me from the top of the woodshed, hoping to make a dash into that inner sanctum. She knows it is warm in there, she loves to sleep among the plants in the sunshine, but not today... I close the door and we go back together, up the snowy path among the silvered firs and ferns, me huddled in my coat and well-content, her with her fur fluffed wide, bounding for the cover of the eaves.
Snow day. A good morning.
