Quiet Days

Drizzle; snow on the mountain, a quiet day reading The Ink Dark Moon, Love Poems by Ono no Komachi and Izumi Shikibu, Women of the Ancient Court of Japan and the latest Jack Reacher thriller by Lee Child. Lovely combination. One of the poems by Izumi Shikibu is perfect for the day.

All the flowers 
have fallen in this wind
blowing through the night.
What will there be
for consolation tomorrow?

[Translated by Jane Hirshfield with Mariko Aratani]

Frost on the grasses

Flood Grasses

Driving into Sutton the other day, I saw where the cut grasses from the sides of the road had been swirled about by Irene's rains leaving garlands along the roadside. In places they were on top of the Pampas grass, as we call it; while in other spots the flow of the water had helped the grasses form structures like nests. I have tried to give you an idea of the garlands [bottom photos] wich I find very moving. it's as if the grasses had memory of their time in the water.

Flood grasses

Garlands of grasses