Submitted by Bob Warfield.
My laptop weather app permits multiple locations and includes sunrise, sunset, among various data. I’ve added Talkeetna, AK, having passing affection for its long days, hot shower, pizza, moose droppings, glacier ready air service, and the sprawling Susitna’s receding shore, releasing space for a pea patch in May
Yesterday, my weather app gave its long day, shortening, exactly ten hours. Today’s closing aperture has clipped six minutes, heading toward winter solstice when daylight will measure 4:34, and the town’s resident potted palm will be indoors catching a dance rhythm at the tavern on Spur Road.
I’ve not been there in winter, but know the silent surround between thaws only concentrates more those embers that remain aglow through days of stolen sun, who’s arc, beaten toward horizon by Raven for flying too high, still calls to Bear Child, dreaming with promise of spring to come. And so it is, for latitudes leaving equatorial sameness toward the extremes of nature’s solar rhythm, and for the celebrations of light we glimpse ahead, … knowing peace is possible.
Alaska is a parallel universe of sorts.
Having fished and hunted most of it (the hard way) in younger years, I appreciate your fondness for her.
Alaska (the hard way) will change your perspective on life, and leave you a more humble.
This is pure poetry on a foggy morning in the Pacific Northwest. It starts off my day on a most dreamy note. Thank you so much, Bob!
The country is beautiful, but the horrendously long nights in winter, the unbelievable smell of spring (think rotting vegetation) when the snow finally melts, in May, were too depressing for me.