Crochet The Weather

Conceptualizing the weather has now become a habit and in 2016 we are creating a crochet block for each day this year. 

The centre of the block is the temperature

and

the outer block is the sky.

In 2016 we will also be featuring the poetry of

Dawna Proudman

Wondering

while February lurches

forward into March

if bird song is destined forever

to be recalled

but never again heard

like stories from our childhoods

we tell and tell and tell

until they are smooth worn

familiar and strange

like wave polished glass

memories of the time before

the ice banished all but the crows –

cavorting like old country widows

their magnificent distraction

from snow upon snow

cloud upon cloud

cocky victory struts

charm and confuse

graceful wings trace drifts

like pirate flags over frozen seas

welcomed by default

by those of us left land locked

(even so,

winter could last a hundred years

and still the crow’s raspy throated scold

would always be the antithesis of song

wouldn’t it?)

will there ever come a time

when windows gape again

like the mouths of youngsters

yowling with glee and awe

catching the notes of sparrows,

doves, warblers, finches

spiralling, billowing upwards into

the blue dome of the universe?

will robins ever come again

to drown the tumble and huff

of wind and wires,

the scrape and grate of snow ploughs,

the whirr and whine

of my unoccupied mind?

six months ago so many birds

regaled us from stands of birch and ash

their notes entwined

like grasses, dog hairs, yarns and twigs

in one nest, I could not guess

which bird sang which lilt

as I wilted in the unforgiving heat

now the sounds they made

elude us, the memory

hollow as bird bones

the words mock our losses

no “tweet” “chirp” “thrum”

disrupts the silence

struck dumb like children

waking to realize

the thing we loved and clutched

– teddy bear, blanket, feather or hope –

has once again disappeared

in the night

this then is the time of faith

for there is nothing else

but prayer and blindness 

we give up wishing for ears of glass

search out a hint of sunlight

don armour sufficient

to fend off bitterness

then stand

just there

where the light erases everything else from view

everything else from memory 

close our eyes

listen 

fervently

for whispers and wings

Grandma Snyder

©2013-2016 twosnydergirls