I stare out at bare window pane above and netted screen below. Drops of rain move across, smooth, quick, lithe on the glass and awkward, meandering, stilted across the finely textured squares of mesh. Windows as release, as way out and through, but my depth of field is shallow, my view shortsighted. In fall, the… Read more »
“Beauty is vapour from the pit of death.” (The Peregrine, p. 180) For the last several months, I’ve been coming to the Henry Art Gallery most Wednesdays to read from a book about a hawk season in the fenlands of eastern England. To describe J.A. Baker’s The Peregrine as only that, though, would be to diminish it. Baker’s… Read more »
We’re coming to the end of daffodil season in Seattle. Everywhere I go, the flowers have been announcing spring, trumpeting forth the news with their proud center coronas and blaze of yellow. It took me a long time to see something more than the daffodil’s bold color and message of seasonal change. These perennial flowers… Read more »
Crows are numerous and newsworthy in Seattle. Widely published research from University of Washington wildlife biologist John Marzluff demonstrates the social birds remembering human faces and teaching other crows to recognize these people. Dr. Marzluff’s work builds on studies that show crows as capable of manipulating tools. Seattle artist Buster Simpson has found in the… Read more »
Last week, a new pope was selected from among his cardinal colleagues. He is the first Jesuit to assume the position, the first pope from Latin America, and the first to choose Francis as his papal name. Saint Francis, namesake to former Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio of Argentina, is something of an anomaly in the… Read more »
Paris, in April, was teeming with people: spring break tourists queuing up to see the famous sights and the politically passionate, or perhaps just paid, papering its telephone poles with images of and messages from politicians who would meet their fates in the elections just after we left. The elegant Museé de la Chasse et… Read more »