hiking in the valley
snow squalls then sunshine
over the last hill
I thought, considering I was away last week, I would give you two haiku this week. The first one was inspired by a hiking trip we took with the a group of girls from my daughter’s class on the last day of our field trip. Everyone was tired after a morning of digging out the quinzhees (a shelter made of a pile of snow that’s been allowed to settle and then the center is dug out – yes, this is just one of the things we Canadians do for fun in the winter) but the afternoon activity was either skate or hike. And I’m not sure which was more “mercurial” the weather or the girls’ tempers, but everything seemed to brighten when we made it back to camp.
winter-killed spruce
juncos still flock
in its branches
The second poem is from something I observed this week at the day job. In the center of the University of Regina campus is a green space called the “Dr Lloyd Barber Academic Green” (named for the University’s second president) that features an oval walk lined with trees. Unfortunately, this winter a few of the transplanted spruce didn’t make it through the cold snap and have turned a rusty brown. But that hasn’t stopped a small flock of dark-eyed juncos from using the trees as a convenient place to catch their breath on their way through the campus from a nearby residential neighbourhood.
