if the chain ever breaks...

With the constant dancing of the auroras in the sky, it's made me think of the Zoryas. Don't know who the Zoryas are? Here's a quick rundown.

Zorya Utrennyaya is the Morning Star
Zorya Vechernyaya is the Evening Star.

They guard and watch over the doomsday hound, Simargl, who is chained to the star Polaris in the constellation Ursa Minor, the "little bear". If the chain ever breaks, the hound will devour the constellation and the universe will end.


 For protection, say the following prayer to the Zorya:
O Virgin, unsheath your father's sacred sword.
Take up the breastplate of your ancestors.
Take up your powerful helmet.
Bring forth your steed of black.
Fly to the open field,
There where the great army with countless weapons is found.
O Virgin, cover me with your veil.
Protect me against the power of the enemy,
Against guns and arrows, warriors and weapons,
Weapons of wood, of bone, of copper and iron and steel.

mama said there'd be days like these

The birds are singing in the middle of the night. The land is breathless, waiting. The sun is so bright that the glare of it off the snow half-blinds you. Everyone feels it—the hare, sometimes spotted in the bracken chewing on wild rose hips; the black fox, darting down his own path through the deep snow beneath the birches; the raven perched on the swaying top of a spruce tree, defying the northern wind. Climb to the tallest peak and gaze out over the snowy valleys. Lift your harp and let the wind pluck the first notes of spring from its strings. Feel the song resonate in your blood, in your marrow, in your bones.

Is it spring yet where you are? Here we are waiting. Breathing in, breathing out. The land is waking slowly, slowly, slowly. The buds will not yet curl from the branches of the diamond willow beside the porch until the ice has broken up from the rivers (hence the nickname for spring, “Break Up”, which is not half as poetic as “Mud Season”). The days will be longer, the air will smell of growing things, and from every branch and bramble the wood will burst with exultant birdsong (almost 20 hrs of it--yeah).

Soon spring (summer) will come(we have just two seasons here—summer and winter). I don't know how to explain it, but it's as though there is a subtle shift in the land. I don't know—I just feel it. How do you know when spring—real, true spring—has come to your neck of the woods?

A few days ago we saw a pair of grouse step out of the (muskeg) and pick their way across the dirt road to the sawmill. We have a theory they are stealing the chicken feed, since the sawmill chickens are free range—however, those chickens met their demise last fall, so the grouse are a bit slow on the uptake on that one. Wild birds here are opportunists. Ravens and magpies like trash, gray jays will eat your sled dog's food if it hasn't yet frozen, and the chickadees like to drink my dishwater (I assume they like the taste of grapefruit biokleen). We have a migratory wildfowl refuge here in town and every August they have a sandhill crane festival. Yesterday we went for a walk with the dog down the Seasonal Wetland Trail. There's something magical about a seasonal wetland covered in snow. I wish I'd taken more pictures—next time.