There is a little good news on the weather front, however. I am taking weekly pictures from my windows as a spring countdown and there has definitely been some progress over the past few days. Let's take a peek, shall we?
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| 1st week |
In the backyard, you can see that there is less snow at the bottom of the beautiful fir tree.
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| 2nd week |
While in the front yard, check out my garden armillary at the right--you can now see all of its third section!
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| 1st week |
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| 2nd week |
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| 1st week |
And while a week ago my garden lamp was sporting a snow cap, it's now cap-free and you can see all of the floral metal design!
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| 2nd week |
February
Winter. Time to eat fat
and watch hockey. In the pewter mornings, the cat,
a black fur sausage with yellow
Houdini eyes, jumps up on the bed and tries
to get onto my head. It’s his
way of telling whether or not I’m dead.
If I’m not, he wants to be scratched; if I am
He’ll think of something. He settles
on my chest, breathing his breath
of burped-up meat and musty sofas,
purring like a washboard. Some other tomcat,
not yet a capon, has been spraying our front door,
declaring war. It’s all about sex and territory,
which are what will finish us off
in the long run. Some cat owners around here
should snip a few testicles. If we wise
hominids were sensible, we’d do that too,
or eat our young, like sharks.
But it’s love that does us in. Over and over
again, He shoots, he scores! and famine
crouches in the bedsheets, ambushing the pulsing
eiderdown, and the windchill factor hits
thirty below, and pollution pours
out of our chimneys to keep us warm.
February, month of despair,
with a skewered heart in the centre.
I think dire thoughts, and lust for French fries
with a splash of vinegar.
Cat, enough of your greedy whining
and your small pink bumhole.
Off my face! You’re the life principle,
more or less, so get going
on a little optimism around here.
Get rid of death. Celebrate increase. Make it be spring.
