Intimations and Murmurations

AT THE CHURCH O’THE PINES THIS WEEK, there have been stirrings among the congregation. Intimations and murmurations. There have been rumblings. No one knows for certain the reason for this disquiet. It could have something to do with the quickening accumulation of daylight minutes. Or the fact that the noonday sun stands higher in the sky. Perhaps it is the round ‘tree holes’ appearing around the trunks of the pines, as the dark-colored bark absorbs the extra light and melts the snow. Maybe it is the occasional warm breath of wind from the south.

Whatever the cause, or all of the above, there have been stirrings. The scent of the skunk is abroad in the wood at night, as the season of seeking—and perhaps finding—a mate has begun. We find ourselves hoping that the skunk family does not return to make their home and raise their babies under our deck. The squirrels, of course, have been nuts for a month, chasing one another up and down the trees and across the yard in their state of ‘twitterpation.’

Sparky The Cardinal, our famed church soloist, has found his full spring voice, no longer limiting himself to modest ‘chips.’ The chickadees sing every day, more and more insistently, their two-note song—‘Spring’s here!’

The crows are active over all the river-woods, this being, in eastern woodlands Native American tradition, the Crow Moon. The bluejays holler, as always. The wild turkeys, sometime visitors, arrive most every day. An eagle has been ‘chirruping’ down the shore each day—pondering, perhaps, the building of a nest in a tall pine.

The great horned owls hoot with their deep, chesty voices each evening at dusk, and sometimes in the middle of the night.
The first drips of maple sap are seen and tasted.

And here on the grounds of the Church O The Pines, one of our most quiet and amiable congregation members, Brother Opossum, appears to gather the crumbs and leavings below the buffet tables in Fellowship Hall. In fact, he even climbs up onto the table. But no one minds. Everyone seems to be in a fine mood. Despite stirrings and intimations. And disquiet. Or perhaps because of them. All in our Church wish you Good Sabbath!

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