Sunflowers and Poetry | Why I Wake Early

Sunflower Goat

Good Morning! I’m dropping in a little earlier than usual because I thought you might like to share your morning tea or coffee with this sunflower-bearing (umm…eating) goat. If it is not morning where you are, you should exit this post and return to it in the morning. Kidding, of course! You can read it now and return to it tomorrow morning, if you choose, because today’s poem by Mary Oliver is about celebrating the early morning and starting our days with happiness and kindness. 

Why I Wake Early
by Mary Oliver
 
Hello, sun in my face.
Hello, you who make the morning
and spread it over the fields
and into the faces of the tulips
and the nodding morning glories,
and into the windows of, even, the
miserable and crotchety–
 
best preacher that ever was,
dear star, that just happens
to be where you are in the universe
to keep us from ever-darkness,
to ease us with warm touching,
to hold us in the great hands of light–
good morning, good morning, good morning.
 
Watch, now, how I start the day
in happiness, in kindness.

About the Image: My pen friend, Kathi G, sent the delightful postcard above. The goat’s name is Rory. Isn’t he absolutely adorable as he munches on a sunflower with a field more of them behind him? This is the work of Dorian Charles of Tabby Hall Designs. Happy eating, Rory!

					

Oh, the Cows!

I got in trouble with my son because of the cow posting a few nights ago.  Sure, I posted “the cow” as he requested, but he didn’t want me to post a “Photoshopped cow” [Note: I didn’t know he was familiar with the term]. He wanted me to post “the cow” in “its” natural state.  So, here’s the photo, no filter.

"For the Little One," No Filter, Northern Alabama, 2013

“For the Little One,” No Filter, Northern Alabama, 2013

And a goat on the same land captured seconds later:

"Who You Lookin' At?" Somewhere in North Alabama, 2013

“Who You Lookin’ At?” or “Through the Barbed Wire,” Somewhere in North Alabama, 2013

And while we’re at it you might as well have some more bovine:

"Bovine Basking on a Beach," Maui, Hawaii, 2005

“Bovine Basking on a Beach,” Maui, Hawaii, 2005

I snapped this one in Maui a long time ago.   I wonder where else in the U.S. we’d find beach-lovin’ bovine.

Moo!