with long slender toes
walks atop vegetation
quite miraculous
Does this Common Gallinule inspire your own haiku? If so, please leave one in the comments.
Month: April 2023
Cleansing breath
My heart is heavy after watching today’s session of Montana’s state House vote to censure trans Representative Zooey Zephyr. The vote was along party lines, 68-32. She is now banned from the House floor and not allowed to speak on legislation, and will only be allowed to vote remotely. Zephyr’s speech in her defense was powerful and brought me to tears. She’s on the right side of history. Those who silence the voices of those speaking on behalf of the oppressed? Nasty, small-minded fascists.
*cleansing breath*
So here is a Bushtit photographed in September of 2021: 
This darling wee bird was accompanied by a whole bunch of other Bushtits that day and I post its photo in honor of the lone Bushtit that briefly visited the feeder as I hoop-danced this morning. It’s exceedingly rare for a Bushtit to travel alone, and I’m hoping it’s only because the rest of the gang was nearby taking cover from the rain.
I receive the gift of this bird’s beautiful presence and now share it with you.
What is that?
I went exploring through photo folders in search of something to post on this rainy (yes, rain! 😀) afternoon and started looking at images from my visit to the Chatfield Audubon Center last May. This one caught my eye because, well, blooms and bees!
I was fairly confident that photo showed a honey bee feasting on Wild Plum blossoms. And I knew for sure the bird on the left was a Common Grackle.
But then I looked some more and came across the photo below and had no idea what I was seeing. The image is poor quality, but I figured there were enough identifying features to make an identification. Sure enough, this is a type of whiptail lizard, specifically, a Six-lined Racerunner (the third photo is the best match). Woot woot!
That research victory got me looking more closely at other photos in the folder and I came across one which proved more difficult to identify. How would you describe this plant? I tried double leaves, spade-shaped leaves, double blooms, and then just searched “colorado wildflower yellow” and there it was: Leafy Spurge.
People keep telling me about cool apps they have on their phones for identifying flora and fauna, but I never remember them in the moment. How about you? Do you use apps? If so, what’s your recommendation?
Climate Movement Monday: Line 5 crude oil pipeline
Welcome back to another Movement Mondays post in which I highlight a climate-related issue and the frontline community directly affected, and offer ways to take action on behalf of that community. Today’s post is about Line 5, a crude oil pipeline built in 1953 during the Eisenhower administration by the Bechtel Corporation and now operated by Enbridge Inc.
Per Oil and Water Don’t Mix: “Enbridge’s Line 5 is a 645-mile petroleum pipeline that is part of the larger Enbridge Lakehead System. Line 5 carries oil from Superior, Wisconsin, across Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, through northern Michigan, down to the thumb region, and under the St. Clair River to Sarnia, Ontario. Along the way, the pipeline crosses through the Straits of Mackinac, 400 rivers, streams, and wetlands. In northern Michigan, it goes through almost 10 miles of wetlands and runs right next to many of our sparkling inland lakes.”
A diver working on behalf of the National Wildlife Federation inspects the Line 5 pipeline at the lake bottom in the Straits of Mackinac during a July 2013 dive.
Water is needed to sustain life–all life requires it–and it’s insanity to expect 70-year-old corroded pipes to safely carry over a half a million barrels (equivalent to 22 million gallons) of oil and natural gas liquids every single day. To make matters even worse, Line 5 cuts across Tribal lands, including the Bad River Reservation, threatening wild lands, wetlands, and connecting rivers and streams. From the Sierra Club: “The Straits of Mackinac are a series of waterways linking Lake Michigan to Lake Huron. Not only do these lakes supply drinking water to millions of inhabitants and support the region’s recreation and fishing sectors, but they also provide habitats for numerous species of plants and animals. A spill here would be catastrophic. According to University of Michigan hydrologist Dave Schwab, the Straits of Mackinac would be “the worst possible place for an oil spill in the Great Lakes.” Compared to other nearby regions, the complex currents here are particularly strong and shift directions frequently — meaning oil would disperse rapidly and spread across great distances.”
Line 5 has already spilled more than 1 million gallons over the past 50 years. Per an email from Earthjustice: “In 2019, the Bad River Band of Lake Superior Chippewa sued Enbridge for trespassing on their reservation in Wisconsin. And two years ago, the State of Michigan ordered Line 5 to stop operating – yet Enbridge continues to operate its pipeline in defiance of that order.”
Line 5 must be shut down. Instead, Enbridge is trying to work around the legal challenge by rerouting Line 5. CONFESSION: I am new to this issue and am struggling to understand the ins and outs, but one thing I know for sure: underwater, corroded crude oil pipelines must be shut down! Biden has the power to do just that. And seeing as how Biden (“the climate president”) is rapidly accelerating the climate crisis with authorization of the Willow Project, the Gulf of Mexico lease sales, the export of liquified natural gas (LNG) in Alaska, and the export of LNG in Texas, he at minimum must shut down Line 5.
PLEASE, take a moment to personalize this letter to Biden and demand he start using his power for good rather than environmental evil. Remember: you don’t need to be long-winded in your letter. Just let him know you want Line 5 shut down! And if you can get a friend or two to also send a letter, that would be awesome!
I love hearing from readers about these climate issues–your thoughts and actions–and hope you share here. Solidarity! ✊🏽
Sleep tight, hold tight
I’m happy to say we received much-needed moisture in the last 48 hours! Yesterday, I woke to about 4 inches of snow on the railing and it continued to lightly snow for several hours more. After it’d stopped, I glanced out the kitchen window and saw a squirrel in the plum bushes behind the fence which is a common sight. But when I looked again a few minutes later, that squirrel was in the same position. Could it be asleep?
Indeed it was. There were several squirrels eating from the two nut munch cylinders we hang on the back fence and they’d been busy as the snow fell, and I wondered if this one was just tuckered out from all the food foraging in the cold. While finches and towhees hopped around the nearby branches, the squirrel slightly opened her eyes while keeping her head down on the branch, and then appeared to go back to sleep.
It wasn’t until other squirrels began chasing each other on top of the fence that this one abandoned its rest. If this squirrel is the same that brazenly ate peanuts from the bird feeder this morning as I watched from just feet away, I’d say the powernap did her good.
Friday Haiku – open mic
pastoral portrait
barely concealed ill intent
bovine assassin
your turn
hit me with a haiku
please
Can’t blame her
I haven’t been outside at all today because of the wind. We received the tiniest bit of rain/snow last night, but today is dry, dry, dry and windy, windy, windy. Not a good combination. So, this image and the following quote feel appropriate.
It seems to me like Mother Nature’s mercy and forgiveness have run dry, as we ceaselessly abuse her and take her for granted in order for us to continue our addiction to using fossil fuels. I’ve gotta say, I don’t blame her. Not one bit.
~ Gloria Reuben
Wordless Wednesday: roosting time for turkey vultures
It’s not my birthday but here’s my wish
There are many, many things I wish would come to pass on behalf of people and planet, but I’m focusing on the personal right now. My wish is for House Wrens to nest in the neighbor’s nest box as they did last year so that I may drink up all that beautiful song* again.
July 3, 2022
Or maybe I’ll be really greedy and wish for wrens to nest at the neighbors’ AND for another pair to come stay in the nest box we hung beneath our deck. Wouldn’t that be something? 💚
*From Cornell’s All About Birds:
Both males and females sing. Males often sing 9-11 times per minute during breeding season. Songs are a long, jumbled bubbling introduced by abrupt churrs and scolds and made up of 12-16 recognizable syllables. Females sing mainly in answer to their mates shortly after pairing up; their songs can include high-pitched squeals unlike any sounds males make.
Friday Haiku + surprise
As I often do on Fridays, I went in search of a photo to use as a haiku prompt and landed on one from a visit to the Rocky Mountain Arsenal National Wildlife Refuge in August of 2021. This image reminded me of childhood when our mother tried to wrangle the five kids for a decent photo that was inevitably ruined by someone flashing bunny ears behind a sibling or making a face or turning away from the camera. Clearly, these cormorants couldn’t care less about me getting a good shot.
And so I wrote this haiku:
many cormorants
but majority headless
group photo challenge
Before posting it I took a closer look, zooming in on the birds nearest the center of the photo, and decided to crop the image to only show those four cormorants. And that’s when I discovered something I’d missed. Do you see it?
A skull!
Holy guacamole. This calls for a whole new haiku:
glossy birds sunbathe
pronghorn antelope keeps watch
sprinting days over
Please join in the fun and comment with your own haiku for this photo!
Thankful Thursday: these two
I’m the last one up and about each morning. Zippy, the dog, and cats all get up earlier, leaving me alone in the closed bedroom. When I’m fully awake and ready to greet the day, I call to Zippy and he opens the door so that these two can jump up on the bed to greet me.
According to Zippy, Marcel the cat and Emma the pup pretty much ignore each other until it’s time to come see me. And then it’s a whole lot of head-butting and grooming on Marcel’s part. Not sure what motivates that loving behavior, but it’s a hella nice way to begin my day. And for that, I’m grateful.
Emma, however, might have other feelings.
Wordless Wednesday: B x 3
Bloom + Butterfly + Bee in the garden on May 22, 2020
Twofer Tuesday: feathered intrigue
Not a high-quality photo, but there’s some drama and intrigue here:
Barr Lake State Park April 8, 2021
I get the sense these two are working hard at ignoring each other because they’re already acquainted. Like, maybe they’ve had prior run-ins and now carry grudges. Or maybe they’ve never met, but that pelican with the stabby, knobby bill scares the bejesus out of the cormorant and beneath the surface it’s paddling like mad to get away.
Maybe they’re both new in town and too shy to strike up a friendship. Or maybe that cormorant’s haughty tilt of the beak is designed to keep other birds at a distance.
Maybe it’s really a well-choreographed water ballet that’s supposed to make us think these two dancers are on a collision course when really they end up executing an elegant near-miss.
More likely, the photo is just a fun little image from two years ago that makes me nostalgic for that day.
Climate Movement Monday: Not Too Late
Welcome back to another edition of Movement Mondays in which I typically highlight a frontline community that’s bearing the brunt of the climate crisis and then offer an action you can take on behalf of that community. Today, I’m taking a different approach and offering a choose-your-own-adventure. Here is Earthjustice’s Action Alert page listing a number of topics for which you can write a quick letter, such as getting chemicals out of water OR saving the endangered Gulf of Mexico whale from extinction OR supporting Green Energy for Puerto Rico. Remember: brief and to-the-point letters are absolutely fine.
I also want to share an excerpt from a book that arrived in the mail today.
From Rebecca Solnit’s opening essay:
To hope is to accept despair as an emotion but not as an analysis. To recognize that what is unlikely is possible, just as what is likely is not inevitable. To understand that difficult is not the same as impossible. To plan and to accept that the unexpected often disrupt plans–for the better and for the worse. To know the powerful have their weaknesses, and we who are supposed to be weak have great power together, power to change the world, have done so before and will again. To know that the future will be what we make of it in the present. To know that joy can appear in the midst of crisis, and that a crisis is a crossroads.
NOT TOO LATE: Changing the Climate Story from Despair to Possibility (edited by Rebecca Solnit & Thelma Young Lutunatabua) is available for purchase through Haymarket Books at 30% off.
I always love to hear when you’ve taken action, read something inspiring, or just want to high-five across the miles, so please share in the comments.
Here’s to a world in which there’s truly justice for all. Solidarity! ✊🏽
Botanic bouquets
Today I joined a new friend from Barnraisers and his family for a visit to the Botanic Gardens in Denver. They live out of state and while we’d only met via zoom, he and I connected through the screen. Happily, his spouse and son were equally fun to talk with. I purposely left my camera at home so as not to be rude about interrupting conversations to take photos, but these beauties were too hard to resist and I used my camera phone to capture their essence.
Here’s another clump highlighting the stems which resemble fluffy evening gowns:
Hooray for the beauty of Pasque Flowers!
Friday Haiku – open mic
concrete lookalike
ancient river creation
conglomerates rock!
your turn
hit me with a haiku
please
Wordless Wednesday: shadow art
Standing at the edge
Things can fall apart, or threaten to, for many reasons, and then there’s got to be a leap of faith. Ultimately, when you’re at the edge, you have to go forward or backward; if you go forward, you have to jump together. ~ Yo-Yo Ma
Okay, mourning dove.
It’s just you and me.
One . . . two . . . three . . . JUMP!
Climate Movement Monday: Weelaunee Forest & Cop City
Welcome back to Movement Mondays in which I highlight a frontline community that’s disproportionately affected by the climate crisis and then offer an opportunity for you to take action on that community’s behalf. Today the focus is on the South River Forest aka Weelaunee Forest and Cop City in Atlanta, surrounded by a largely Black neighborhood. Note: I started writing my own version of events but realized there was no point in reinventing the wheel. Here, instead, are some handy graphics from Defend the Atlanta Forest to get you up to speed:
Additional info: from 2017-2021, the South River Forest (Weelaunee) was the centerpiece of a proposed 3,500-acre greenspace that would be protected from development. Then Cop City was announced in November 2021. Read the history of the forest that includes stolen Muscogee land and a prison farm (here and here).
Additional info: Cop City would be the largest police training facility in the U.S., training police in urban warfare using firearms, tear gas, helicopters, and explosive devices. Cop City is made possible through donations to the Atlanta Police Foundation from entities such as Amazon, UPS, Delta Airlines, Home Depot*, and Wells Fargo.
Additional info: Dekalb County Commission plans to bulldoze an historic cemetery in an adjacent neighborhood in order to build a $5 million intersection for trucks servicing the movie studio.
Additional info: the Atlanta PD has also charged 42 people with domestic terrorism, the majority arrested while attending a peaceful music festival in the forest. “Domestic terrorism” carries a minimum 5-year sentence and maximum 35-year sentence. Previously, this charge came as result of injury or death to 10+ people, but is now being used in relation to property damage.
In summary, what we’re witnessing here is climate destruction and an escalation of the police state. It’s no coincidence that as conditions worsen for workers and the most vulnerable communities in this country, and as the climate crisis ratchets up, the powerful are pushing to expand and militarize the police. They see the dystopian future in which desperate people will be fighting for food and water, and have decided that rather than invest in people and planet, it’s best to train police in urban warfare in order to suppress uprisings against the ruling elite.
There are many tactics being used to #StopCopCity and while I live in Colorado, I’ve been able to show solidarity by making legal donations, along with phone calls and emails asking contractors to PLEASE earn goodwill in their community that overwhelmingly opposes this project by cutting ties with Cop City. Defend the Forest offers these suggestions:
There are many ways to get involved. You can support online, help organize your community, show up for actions, or any other number of activities depending on your availability and comfort level. The movement appreciates the need for diverse tactics, meaning many forms of struggle that move towards a common goal. Here’s some more ideas:
- You can sign up for sporadic text alerts here: 470.606.1212
- You can Visit the forest at 3251 W Side Place, Atlanta GA 30316.
- You can donate to on-the-ground forest defense and community groups.
- You can donate to legal & bail support fund for protestors.
- You can donate to the lawsuit challenging the Dekalb County movie studio land swap.
- You can organize protests, send phone calls or emails, or help with direct actions of different kinds to encourage contractors of the various projects to stop the destruction. You can find some of the contractors here: stopreevesyoung.com
- Call Brasfield & Gorrie (678.581.6400), the Atlanta Police Foundation (770.354.3392), and the City of Atlanta (404.330.6100) and ask them to cancel the project and to remain peaceful with tree-sitters and other on-the-ground protesters.
- You can form an Action Group in your community, neighborhood, town, city, college, or scene. Together, you can host information nights, movie screenings, potluck dinners, and protests at the offices of contractors, at the homes of the board members, on campus, or elsewhere. You can post and pass out fliers at public places and shows, knock on doors to talk to neighbors and sign them up for text alerts, fundraisers, or actions, or you can innovate new activities altogether.
- You can conduct independent research about the destruction of the forest, construction projects, their funders, their contractors, or lesser-known details about the project using public records searches or other open source investigation techniques and send your findings to us at defendtheatlantaforest[at]protonmail[dot]com
- You can organize to join or create a camp in the South River/Weelaunee Forest. Respect people’s space and try to be friendly.
- Finally, you and friends or your group could organize to caravan down to the forest from near or far during weeks of action.
THANK YOU IF YOU’VE READ THIS FAR! I’D LOVE TO HEAR YOUR THOUGHTS ON ALL THIS. It’s a lot of information, but it’s important to have this on our radar.
The powerful believe they can stream-roll over people and planet. Me? I believe in people power. Solidarity! ✊🏽
*update: Home Depot Workers United calls for Home Depot to pull their support for Cop City
I receive this melodious gift
Just ran out on the trails for the first time in a couple weeks. I don’t usually go out there on the weekends because it’s more crowded than during the week but I’ve missed the open space, so off I went. And my fears were correct: there were quite a few people and dogs out there. However, someone I’m always happy to share that space with was also there:
Wikimedia Commons: Photo by Rick Bohn
My first Western Meadowlark of the season! As I chugged up the slog, my ears were suddenly filled with liquid song and for a split second, I couldn’t remember what I was hearing. And then my brain processed the sound and I grinned. When I reached the top/turnaround point, I did some stretches as the meadowlark sang its little heart out. I finally spotted it up on the ridge, atop a yucca plant, and called out, “Thank you! I receive the gift of your song!”
And then I ran back down the trail. Oh, happy day.
Tracy Abell 