A decade ago, I started the festival of Borrowed. It’s on February 28th or 29th (depending on which is available), and is a reminder that the Earth is precious and ecosystems are fragile. It seems even more relevant in the face of the climate emergency.
Continue readingenvironment
Indigenous water rights
I wrote this in July 2019.
I am currently sitting beside Lake Erie (Erielhonan), one of the largest bodies of fresh water in the world. The surface area of the Great Lakes is about the same as the surface area of the British Isles (a statistic I’ve often quoted to impress the sheer size of Canada upon my fellow English people).
Despite Canada possessing the largest body of fresh water in the world, a significant percentage of the original inhabitants of this northern area of Turtle Island do not have running water in their homes.
Continue readingBorrowed, 2023
Some years ago, I started the festival of Borrowed. It’s on February 28th or 29th, and is a reminder that the Earth is precious and ecosystems are fragile. It seems even more relevant in the face of the climate emergency.
Continue readingNature notes 5
Nature notes, Sunday 26 February, -7°C.
Walked by Hespeler Millpond. The fresh layer of snow was not slippery. We saw four or five swans. There were some rabbit tracks across the snow that’s laid on the frozen surface of the millpond. There’s also a fallen tree that was felled by a beaver. The sky was blue, crisp, and clear.
Nature notes 4
Nature notes, 20 February 2023. 3°C. Sunny with a few clouds. Damp.
Went for a walk in Dumfries Conservation Area. Saw a few ferns, some birch trees, various conifers, a grey squirrel, and lots of chickadees at a feeder by the parking lot. Also this lovely moss. Now that the snow is almost all gone, the forest floor, and stumps and rocks with moss on them, are once again visible.
Continue readingVintage nature notes 1992
Some of my nature notes from 1992.
Continue readingWassailing
It’s the time of year for Wassailing in the apple-growing regions of England (Herefordshire, Somerset, Worcestershire, etc), and places where the weather is warm enough that fruit trees can blossom. (In Ontario, Canada, we wait until February to do the Wassailing.)
Continue readingSeasonal markers
Crow at @marget.inglis_witchcraft asks, what are the markers of the turning of the seasons for you. Not public holidays or specific festivals, high days & holy days, but those moments when you notice a change every year.
Here are mine for our house and garden in southern Ontario:
Continue readingThe singing will never be done
Once, you could hear
Sheep munching grass
Half a mile away.
Now the soundscape
Is full of mechanical sounds:
Auditory assault.
We have lost the music of the world:
Birdsong, animal sounds
The wind in the trees.
Birds have to sing louder
To be heard over the sound of cars.
Whale song is interrupted by ships.
The singing will never be done,
But no one can hear it when
we have lost the music of the world.
Yvonne Aburrow
8:19 am, 2 May 2022
“three large rabbit-breaths of air”
See the world as a rabbit sees it.
Wide angle view,
Not straight ahead
As a predator sees,
But sidelong, as prey animals see.
Long shadows,
Tall grass.
Noting every hiding place.
Ready to bolt
At the first sign
Of predators.
Each breath taken
Short and shallow.
Darting from shelter
To shelter.
Grass here,
Lettuce there.
Sun is warm,
Earth is kind.
Yvonne Aburrow
7:50 am, 28 April 2022
Inspired by the phrase “three large rabbit-breaths of air” in the poem My Weather by Jane Hirshfield
If you enjoyed this post, you might like my books.
Dowsing for Divinity 