P52 12/52: Hum

Copyright ©2015 Deborah M. Zajac. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

P52 12 of 52  HUM

It’s officially Spring! The Wildflowers are popping up all over, and the bees are busy at work.
I made this image yesterday while on a Wildflower Hike on Table Mountain in Butte County, CA.

Here’s one of my favorite poems about Bees by Mary Oliver. My favorite Nature Poet.

Hum
What is this dark hum among the roses?
The bees have gone simple, sipping,
that’s all. What did you expect? Sophistication?
They’re small creatures and they are
filling their bodies with sweetness, how could they not
moan in happiness? The little
worker bee lives, I have read, about three weeks.
Is that long? Long enough, I suppose, to understand
that life is a blessing. I have found them — haven’t you? —
stopped in the very cups of the flowers, their wings
a little tattered — so much flying about, to the hive,
then out into the world, then back, and perhaps dancing,
should the task be to be a scout-sweet, dancing bee.
I think there isn’t anything in this world I don’t
admire. If there is, I don’t know what it is. I
haven’t met it yet. Nor expect to. The bee is small,
and since I wear glasses, so I can see the traffic and
read books, I have to
take them off and bend close to study and
understand what is happening. It’s not hard, it’s in fact
as instructive as anything I have ever studied. Plus, too,
it’s love almost too fierce to endure, the bee
nuzzling like that into the blouse
of the rose. And the fragrance, and the honey, and of course
the sun, the purely pure sun, shining, all the while, over
all of us.~Mary Oliver, Sacred Poems

Nikon Df| AF-D Nikkor 105mm f2.8 Micro lens| Hand-held| Hoodman STEEL Ultra High Speed Digital Film

More to come…

P52 28/52 To make a prairie…

Copyright © Deborah M. Zajac. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

To make a prairie~ Emily Dickinson, 1830-1886To make a prairie it takes a clover and one bee,
One clover, and a bee.
And revery.
The revery alone will do,
If bees are few.
~Emilly Dickinson

Image taken laying on my belly in my front yard at the beginning of evening Golden Hour. The clover is popping up in patches here and there…I sometimes think we should let it take over. Though most consider it a weed, and blight on the lawn (He-Man included) I like it!

 

Addendum: Woo-whoo! I’ve passed the halfway mark of my Project 52! It’s actually gone by pretty fast.

Nikon D300s| AF-D Nikkor 105mm @f9 + Kenko 20mm extension tube| Hand-held

Travelerette on the Wildflower Trail

Copyright © 2014 Deborah M. Zajac. All Rights Reserved.

Myself and He-Man headed north-east to Sierra National Forest looking for Spring Wildflowers. We found a few mountain sides covered in California Poppies, and several other Wildflowers in bloom.

We saw Blue Dicks, Lupin two types Miniature, and a larger purple one Mountain? There were buttercups, and Goldfields, Chinese Houses, a tiny white flower like Baby’s Breath, but not. I need to ID that one, and lots of grass! The recent rains really greened things up nicely.

Travelerette and WildflowersWe got to the Trail-head in the late morning with the sun shining, but the Poppies decided to sleep late on this Saturday morning.

We hiked about 2 miles round trip on this trail, then headed to Yosemite to check out the waterfalls, and do a bit of hiking there. Images to follow.

 

Nikon D700| AF-S Nikkor 17-35mm f/2.8| Hand-held- Sierra National Forest, California USA