Monday
Goodbye cold and windy February...
Charles Burchfield (1893-1967):
'North Wind in March', 1960-1966
It has been so cold and windy here in Copenhagen -
for a long time! No matter what you did, it found it's
way through your thick winter coat, your gloves...
your door and windows...the cold north wind...
Wonder if March will be as windy?
Noooo, I don't think so :O)
Sunday
'The Wind Flower'...when the March winds blow...
The Enchanted Castle:
A Book of Fairy Tales from Flowerland
edited by Hartwell James,
illustrated by John R. Neill (1877-1943)
First published in 1906
link
'The coy Anemone, that ne'er unclosesHer lips, until they're blown on by the wind'.
H. Smith
LORA, Queen of all the flowers,fell in love with Zephyr, the West-wind, whose gentle breezes
fanned her favorite blossoms, cooling them when the fierce rays
of the sun fell hot upon them. But Zephyr cared not for Lady Flora.
Zephyr loved a gentle nymph, who returned his affection,
but ere she could become his bride Flora changed her into
a plant whose pale blossoms shine and twinkle in the woods
like stars on a dark night.
Now this fair nymph was beloved not only by Zephyr,
the gentle West-wind, but by Boreas, the cold, rough North-wind,
and it happened that the time at which she became a flower
was at that season when 'the North-wind doth blow',
so Boreas had her in his power.
And then to punish her for bestowing her love upon another,
he blew roughly upon her and scattered her delicate petals
upon the ground. Then the gods, because she was beloved by
the winds, called her Anemone, the wind-flower.
Every year when the March winds blow she opens herdainty blossoms, and every year Boreas revenges his
unrequited love by shattering and destroying her beauty.
But the gentle Anemone returns good for evil, for she loves
the wind, and opens her soft pink and white petals when
the March breezes blow loud and shrill.
The poets call her 'Child of the Wind', and country people
tell us she is a capital weather-glass, for when the wind drops and
rain clouds begin to gather she knows that rain is coming.
Gentle, loving little flower, 'Waiting for the breathing of the wind',
we can all have a lesson from you. Why not be like the Anemone,
and when others use you roughly, seek not revenge,
but rather give good for evil.
Never tread beneath your feet
Flowers fair and flowers sweet;
Touch us tenderly with care
Flowers sweet and flowers fair.
Flowers fair and flowers sweet;
Touch us tenderly with care
Flowers sweet and flowers fair.
'At the Back of the North Wind'
Above is a wood engraving created by Arthur Hughes from
'At the Back of the North Wind'...a children's book written
by George Macdonald in 1857. It is a fantasy about a boy
named Diamond and his adventures with the Lady North Wind
link
