Photo from the BBC South Yorkshire Winter Photos site
The golden crocus reaches up
To catch a sunbeam in her cup. -Walter Crane
Last May, when I had just received my new camera with the video feature, I recorded my daughter singing the Crocus song she learned at school. Despite the rough quality and the click at the end (I hadn't yet figured out how to edit, so everything was a one-take feature), you at least hear the tune for the song:
Crocus, crocus, waking up
Catch a sunbeam in your cup
Hold it tight, let it go,
Li-la, Li-la, li-lay-lo.
In the stories my family tells, crocuses and snowdrops are best friends because they're usually the first bulb flowers to poke their noses out of the ground. Recently, I composed a verse for the snowdrop:
Snowdrop, snowdrop, hanging down
Lantern shining in the town
Cold winds blow, you still grow,
Li-la, Li-la, li-lay-lo.
Photo from Irish Gardeners
You may wonder just where that snowdrop lantern shining in the town may be. Check a copy of Voices in the Park, by Anthony Browne. You'll find it. Speaking of Voices in the Park, I've had that book for years, and for awhile, each time I read it aloud to my daughter, I discovered something in the pictures I hadn't noticed before.
6 comments:
Lovely.
A link, despite our geographic and biospheric differences! Today,in the high desert, I saw three golden crocuses blooming. (The kindergartners had planted them last fall.) Thanks for the link again to Lucia's song. It cheered me.
Here in the brrr-land, we have white/purple crocus hybrids, which begin to bloom in, of all things, December. They are a reminder that all things will be made new in Spring... I was shocked to find the first, thinking the flowers confused, but nope! Looking forward to the true crocuses soon.
Your crocus photo came from BBC South Yorkshire! Don't you think that that is an absolutely wonderful thing about the Internet - the ability to travel in cyberspace and explore the world. I have often read online American papers....In our garden, the snowdrops I planted last August when I was ill with e-coli were just coming through when the snow dropped on us!
YP: When I found that photo, I knew I had to post it in your honor! I'm glad your snowdrops are coming through. Ours are peeping up as well. I remember your e-coli bout-- gah.
Tanita: Crocuses in December? I understand about flowers needing to get ahead so they don't have to compete for pollination, but December is so... wintery.
There is a section of our yard where I'd grown bulbs last year, but then dug them all up to allow the yard to take over the spot again. I'm tickled that there are still some bulbs coming up this year-- grape hyacinths, I suspect, but perhaps some of the regular hyacinths as well.
Melangell: I didn't know there were crocuses in the high desert! We'll have to add those to the Southwest seasonal nature table offerings. (For everyone else: mom and I have been talking about making nature table figures that specifically represent foliage in New Mexico.)
LSM: As always, thank you for checking in.
So sweet. Spring. So many gifts it gives after such a dryspell.
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