The Big Backyard
The Big Backyard

Seeking Red

These are the days when warmth is uncanny and green persists. The songbirds have left only the wind singing through the green. It’s time for …

Footprints

Everything seems solid now, but the evidence is still here below the rumpled surface: an unknown creature appeared at dusk, made a transit across a …

Icicle

They grow like reverse weeds, tiny and fragile and only a little bit cold.  They’ll feed on snow, transformed by cold nights and sunny days …

Microcosm

A forest on a mountaintop, sheer cliffs of dizzying heights set in a sea of brown and curling waves.  We can hardly see the stars …

Old Shoe

Another artefact, cracked and moss-covered, lies damply beside the brook.  There is a iron-mine of rusting garbage in this spot, along with still-recognizable household items …

Before the Fall

They aren’t wild apples; once, this was a field or an orchard, and a human hand planted this tree.  Now, alders and hawthorn grow up …

Out of Season

There’s something about finding a single wild strawberry in autumn, ripe for eating.  It’s a late bloomer, a tortoise, a valiant effort, a Rocky, an …

Revealed

The path is so overgrown that I have to cut my way through with long-handled pruning shears.  When I look up, an abandoned nest is …

Beavers or Trees

Overnight, a small pond has been transformed into a large one.  Trees stand knee-deep in water, unable to wade to higher ground.  This slow drowning …

Feather

A hawk’s feather lies along the path.  I stop to examine it, look carefully around to see if there are any others hidden among the …