Along Piney Woods Church Road, the earliest to bloom of the red maples have begun producing seeds. These nascent maple keys have not yet developed their final shape, but are merely tiny, oval forms suspended where the flowers used to be.
Mar 222014
Mar 212014
This photograph is just what it claims to be, taken late this morning about a third of the way along my walk down Piney Woods Church Road.
Mar 212014
Again, I set out to find new wildflowers, to no avail. The catkins on a couple of trees are nearly in bloom, but not yet. It is still the time of year when henbit and bluet hold sway. So I found some more red and brown leaves, instead. I sat down at the side of the road to photograph a couple of greenbrier leaves; midway through, I looked through the viewfinder toward the space just in front of me, and became entranced by long, thin blades of dry grass, making twirling forms in the breeze. Not exactly springlike, but still beautiful.
Tomorrow I will go in search of last autumn’s leaves. Maybe that way I will find a new flower in bloom along Piney Woods Church Road.
Mar 202014
While hauling branches of a fallen cedar across my backyard, I discovered two splotches of bright purple standing out against the greens and browns of my still-mostly-dormant lawn. The first violets of the season are in bloom!
Mar 202014
On this first day of spring, I set out down Piney Woods Church Road in search of an appropriately evocative subject for a portrait. I was hoping for another spring wildflower — purple violets are blooming today in my backyard, and I was expecting I might find one on my stroll. The only flower in bloom along the roadside that I have not documented in this blog is a tiny yellow blossom with a green center that belongs to a weed that prefers wet places and stalwartly resists being brought into focus in my lens, despite several days, wet shoes, and muddy cuffs.
What caught my eye, instead, was a minute red leaf, the size of my pinky fingernail (and I have small hands). It was one leaf of only a few, on a roadside plant I could not identify (mostly because there was so little of it present in the first place). The plant appeared to have been mowed, or cropped by a horse or a deer. The leaf was such a brilliant red color that I felt called upon to photograph it.
There is something delightfully symmetrical about this picture, evoking autumn on the first day of spring. I am reminded of the Chinese yin-yang symbol, in which both dark and light contain within themselves a circle of the other. In this same way, my spring walk contained, as well, a reminder of the autumn to come.
But for now, bring on the wildflowers!
Mar 192014
And after the vibrant yellow bloom has passed, and the feathery seeds have all dispersed, after all that, there is sa certain beauty to the form of a dandelion stalk still standing along the roadside.
Mar 192014
There is such grace and beauty in the curving form of a single blade of onion grass growing along the roadside. To think that we consider it a common weed, and spray it with chemicals to remove it from our lawns….
Being unable to decide whether I prefer the image in color or black-and-white, I am posting both forms below; I welcome reader comments.
Mar 182014
Along the grassy verges of Piney Woods Church Road, common chickweed (Stellaria media) is coming into bloom. Alas, it has so many strikes against it already: the flowers are minute (maybe half a centimeter across), the plant itself is low-growing and inconspicuous, and it is a common weed inhabiting lawns, road edges, and waste places across all of North America. Do a Google search for chickweed, and the top item on the list is liable to be an ad for weed killer. Common chickweed isn’t even native to these shores; it crossed the Atlantic from Europe. In its travels, it managed to pick up quite a few common names, including adder’s mouth, passerina, satin flower, starweed, starwort, stitchwort, tongue-grass, and winterweed. It does have many uses; it is an edible field green, and can be used to treat coughs when taken as a tea, and relieve itches when applied as a salve. And it makes a lovely portrait, for those who have the patience to sit beside it on the rain-soaked ground and keep taking close-ups, hoping for one that will be more or less in focus.
Mar 182014
What can be more Georgia than this: loblolly pines reflected in water tinted red with Georgia red clay?
Mar 172014
Along Piney Woods Church Road, a ditch filled with water after two days of rain reflects trees, barbed wire fencing, and sky. There is so much to stop and notice on the edges of our vision, out of the corners of our eyes…
