More Of What I Did Today, Photog Edition

I also took some pics today. I hope you enjoy.

Bumblebee for Shutterwi.

Yellow/Tiger Swallowtail & Lilacs

Tiger/Yellow Swallowtail & Lilacs #2

Yellow/Tiger Swallowtail & Lilacs #3

Tiger/Yellow Swallowtail & Lilacs #4

To find out more about Yellow/Tiger Swallowtails, go here. To find out more about lilacs go here. There is nothing quite so sweet as a lilac bush in bloom. It's beautiful & the aroma is something that calms the bejesus out of me.

Here's more on lilacs, poetry edition. The Wasteland. This poem was written by T. S. Eliot. It was a poem every college freshman read, at least the college freshmen at UW-Madison in 1967. Here are the first few lines.

April is the cruelest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.

& here are the first three stanzas of a poem, When Lilacs Last in the Door-Yard Bloom'd, by one of the few great poets America has produced, Walt Whitman.

1

WHEN lilacs last in the door-yard bloom’d,
And the great star early droop’d in the western sky in the night,
I mourn’d—and yet shall mourn with ever-returning spring.

O ever-returning spring! trinity sure to me you bring;
Lilac blooming perennial, and drooping star in the west,
And thought of him I love.

2

O powerful, western, fallen star!
O shades of night! O moody, tearful night!
O great star disappear’d! O the black murk that hides the star!
O cruel hands that hold me powerless! O helpless soul of me!
O harsh surrounding cloud, that will not free my soul!

3

In the door-yard fronting an old farm-house, near the white-wash’d palings,
Stands the lilac bush, tall-growing, with heart-shaped leaves of rich green,
With many a pointed blossom, rising, delicate, with the perfume strong I love,
With every leaf a miracle......and from this bush in the door-yard,
With delicate-color’d blossoms, and heart-shaped leaves of rich green,
A sprig, with its flower, I break.