I can’t imagine living year long in a temperate climate. I love all the seasons, and they connect me to life and nature in a deep and meaningful way. Or at least they do when I pay attention. I’ve often thought that seasons heighten my awareness of time passing, which is bittersweet, but also valuable. In a weirdly related way, it’s why I’ve never colored my hair (okay, other than a temporary glaze a few times).
I love winter for so many reasons. One simple one is that, to my eyes at least, it’s simply stunning. I’m drawn to the stark contrasts of light and dark. To the beauty of snow and ice and to the grace of bare tree branches. Winter is filled with subtle mysteries. It offers up the bones of the world, and exposes things in new ways.
Still, sometimes I find myself wishing for a little color. Recently, on a freezing, not-much-snow-around-this-January day, an image popped up in my Facebook feed :
It was a painting by artist, Jane Dahmen, entitled “River Landscape.” Viewing this landscape with its vibrant colors felt like a detonation. They fed something in me that I hadn’t even realized was hungry.
On Viewing “River Landscape” in Winter
I yearn to lick vermilion patches like lollipops,
feel their red and orange scratch
and splash on my tongue,
absorb the bold bursts of amber and pine
into the stream of my cold, sluggish blood.
Oh! to grab dripping handfuls
of effervescent blue
raise them to my nose
and inhale the coursing river,
let it ripple down my throat
anointing all lying dormant within.
Surrounded by a landscape
swathed in grays and whites,
I feast.
©Molly Hogan, draft
Until spring arrives with its shy greening and tentative bursts of color, I’ll continue to drink from winter’s chilly brew. It remains delicious.
This week’s Poetry Friday Roundup is hosted by the effervescent Jan at her blog bookseedstudio. Be sure to stop by and warm up with the poetry goodness on offer!
Nix the comfort zone 
O Molly, curator of this amazing space Your photography could be exhibited on art museum walls in Montreal, Chicago, D.C. & dozens of other celebrated spaces. I especially love the b/w delicate whirl of snow on metal. And if Jane Dahmen is alive, has an agent, etc. please consider sending her your literary art that celebrates her visual art. They belong together!
I could return again & again, to soak up this page.
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Thanks so much, Jan! After you suggested it, I did send the poem along to Jane Dahmen. Hopefully she enjoys it, or at least appreciates knowing she was an inspiration. Thanks again for hosting.
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Molly, what a great poem – love the emphasis on color and all the emotions it evokes. I love all four seasons too but feel blessed to be able to be in the Caribbean right now with actual colors on which I can feast my eyes. Thanks for sharing your mid-winter feast!
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Some Caribbean color sounds like a real treat! I hope you enjoyed your trip.
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Oh! So delicious. Your sensory details are spectacular. I want to taste and feel all those things in that painting too. I love ending on that word, “feast.”
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Thanks, Linda! That word was a late revision, so I’m glad you commented on it 🙂 and that it worked for you.
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This post is simply dripping with sensory delight, Molly. Gorgeous photos, gorgeous painting, and gorgeous poem.
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Thanks, Karen! Enjoying some bold color in the midst of winter can be a real pick-me-up!
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Molly, everything in your world gleams with joy whether its black and white photography or a bright beeming piece of art. Thanks for the photos of your locale. Winter finds its home in your heart.
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It’s been an odd winter this year. Very cold. No snow to speak of until now. The skaters have been having a wonderful time on lakes that never came close to freezing last year!
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I love how this painting awakened a poem with so many images, tastes, and scents. Delicious.
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It was an unexpected treat!
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Your photos are amazing, and your poem bursts with color joy in sight and taste and smell. I enjoyed the feast!
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I’m so glad, Rose! It really did feel like a feast. The bonus with it being a painting is that I could repeatedly return for more without running out!
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Wow, Molly! First, I feel the same way you do about winter. Your first two paragraphs had me nodding in recognition. And then your poem–so visceral and hungry, luxuriating in drinking in the colors. What a beautiful contrast.
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Winter’s the best, isn’t it!? I’m so glad to know you feel the same way. There’s so much to discover in winter!
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I adore this poem, Molly. It INSISTS on being read aloud! Thank you.
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Thanks so much, Liz! I loved lingering with the painting while I wrote it.
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I feel much the same way! I find the changing of the seasons so refreshing – I look forward to different outfits, activities, even foods! It breaks up the year into exciting little chunks, each one with its own wonders (and less idyllic aspects) to experience.
Life is to be enjoyed fully, with body and soul!
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Yes! I feel exactly this way!
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Molly – I love your ode to winter, to the changing seasons, and how it lives in your bones. And that love is not diminished by the frenzied consumption of color in Dahmen’s beautiful painting. I love how it sated you just enough…a mid-winter dalliance. 🙂
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I love the idea that this is a “mid-winter dalliance.” lol Thanks, Patricia!
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