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Suspension: photo by efo, 29 January 2014
We stood by a pond that winter day,
And the sun was white, as though chidden of God,
And a few leaves lay on the starving sod;
-- They had fallen from an ash, and were gray.
Your eyes on me were as eyes that rove
Over tedious riddles of years ago;
And some words played between us to and fro
On which lost the more by our love.
The smile on your mouth was the deadest thing
Alive enough to have strength to die;
And a grin of bitterness swept thereby
Like an ominous bird a-wing….
Since then, keen lessons that love deceives,
And wrings with wrong, have shaped to me
Your face, and the God curst sun, and a tree,
And a pond edged with grayish leaves.
Thomas Hardy (1840-1928): Neutral Tones, 1867, in Wessex Poems and Other Verses, 1898
crosses / marking absences (morning, Munroe Falls Metro Park, Summit County, Ohio): photo by wood_owl, 11 January 2014
today the snow (edge of Heron Pond, Munroe Falls Metro Park, Summit County, Ohio): photo by wood_owl, 26 January 2014
Abandoned orchard, Ward Hill, Andover, Massachusetts: photo by Jim Rohan (LowerDarnley), 28 January 2014
Twister (contrail, Middlesex Fells, Stoneham, Massachusetts): photo by Jim Rohan (LowerDarnley), 2 February 2014