Uncategorized – Page 52

Recent birds.

From top: Vermilion flycatcher (Pyrocephalus rubinus), Bewick’s wren (Thryomanes bewickii), and black phoebe (Sayornis nigricans), at Veteran’s Memorial Park, Sierra Vista, Arizona.

That hard to reach spot.

This contortionist house finch (Haemorhous mexicanus) is gathering preen oil from its uropygial gland. The secretions will be transferred from beak to feathers, for water-proofing and to maintain feather flexibility.

Ramsey Creek.

Naco. Walls.

All of the photos in this set are from a walk in the border town of Naco, in Sonora, Mexico. The bottom photo is of the existing 5 meter (17 foot) border wall looking toward Naco, Arizona and the Mule Mountains in Bisbee. The U.S. side of the wall has been recently draped with ugly coils of concertina wire. This is not Donald Trump’s promised “big beautiful wall,” which will be nearly double in height. As grotesque as it will be, it will not reach the heights of his monumental ego and xenophobia.

Did you know that one can learn a new language, even if you are advanced in years? No, I don’t think it’s possible either. But I am trying to learn Spanish. Es muy difícil. I am unable to find a Spanish color-word that’s equivalent to the English color-word rust. The best alternative seems to be el color óxido, but

óxido alone would refer only to a corroded substance, and not its color. Can anyone help?

Fortitude is one of those words I knew was important when I first learned it, but that took time to understand, to practice, to be made a quality. The word is defined as “courage in pain or adversity.” This is one of the most beautiful definitions of a word not beautiful. I believe adversity can breed brilliance beyond what those with safe and comfortable lives are capable of.

Tommy Orange, in “Escape Velocity,” an essay in Esquire (October 2019) on the life of 17-year old Jeffrey Martinez, a young man of the Sicangu and Oglala Lakota living in Oakland, California.

Gimme strength.

I’ll be taking a break, no endpoint determined.

This is an illustration of a gar. Of course I have a story about gar. I’ll tell you when I get back.

The image is adapted from a plate in The Natural History of Carolina, Florida, and the Bahama Islands, printed in London in 1771. Made available with other scientific illustrations in the public domain through the Biodiversity Heritage Library flickr stream.

Friend-of-the-blog @robertpatrick saw shades of Robert Motherwell in today’s owl silhouette. I’m not sure if this is the painting he had in mind

— I see a wet raven, not an owl

— but I’m delighted by the Motherwell association.

Beside the Sea #34 / Robert Motherwell / black oil paint on paper / 1962.

Image adapted from the digital collections of the Art Institute of Chicago.

I know. But I do not approve. And I am not resigned.

Fragment from “Dirge Without Music” by Edna St. Vincent Millay, in Collected Poems, 1928. The poem is my current memorization project, apropos of my present feisty mood.

Plumage.

Sandhill crane (Antigone canadensis) at the Whitewater Draw Wildlife Area near McNeal, Arizona.