“O frabjous day! Callooh callay! He chortled in his joy.” from “Jabberwocky,” by Lewis Carroll
By April 6th, we in the Northeast of the United States expect a frabjous day or two per week. Instead of delightful days, we are due for more cold, wind, and snow for our delight. The sight of the red male cardinal against the landscape is as startling as it was in November! Wednesday felt on the verge of bone chilling, and was very wet. My eyes scanned the seemingly desolate landscape of our field and hills. Suddenly, they snapped into a higher level of seeing, and were filled with the colors of the landscape. Why had I never seen these colors of April before? My eyesight hasn’t changed: I haven’t had eye surgery, and while newish, my eyeglasses are a similar prescription. I haven’t suffered a blow to the head.
What was the difference? I looked.
What did I see when I really looked? I saw the amber and honey of the winter field grasses, the copper and ocher of dead leaves. Nothing dull, nothing desolate. My optic nerve transmitted the brilliant green of moss on trees, pieces of Ireland transported. The cones in my retina mediated the green-black of the evergreens, the verdigris of lichen on the trees, and the rust of the sumac fruits.
Looking again, I saw that the daffodils poking up are a scallion green, a much darker green than the lilies likewise exploring and retreating. The iron gray-green of the small river, dotted with grey and white stones, churning white as it sweeps its minerals and little fish toward the ocean. The browns, whites, and peach colors of the bare tree trunks standing ready for something to happen aloft (and something is happening—the sap is running). The blue jays, blue birds, and the raspberry heads of the male purple finches at the feeder providing shots of color to the palette of the yard.
The Eyes Have It
No two people see colors exactly the same, or so I’ve experienced, as in, “You call that green? It’s blue!” My eye is less expert at finding the colors that my friend Trina Sternstein, a painter of exquisite and provocative landscape, is able to see (http://www.trinasearssternstein.net/gallery). However, there is one thing I can write with some certainty: except for one fellow, nothing in our landscape now is red.
“Red in tooth and claw;”
Nature is red in tooth and claw, but there’s been little sign of red lately. Nothing even hints at red, except our male cardinal, who more than hints—he shouts, sings, and dances red. He was our constant red this winter, living with his lady wife, herself a lovely brown and orange. Against the white of snow or the bare, brown branches, his red continues to startle and please. He’s so very red and visible—as a streak flying by or sitting still in his handsomeness. It’s hard to see how he survives the hawks, but he does. The cardinals stay here for the winter and don’t endure the stress of migration. They build their nests (he brings the materials, she builds the nest to fit her body) early. Although cardinals are not good at producing fledglings that survive, they have more than one brood per season, which increases their chances.
In this blessedly peaceful place, patience must reign. We must wait just a little while for more red, of a more gentle, less tooth and claw source. The buds on trees will swell and turn red; sunsets will produce a red among the gold, pink and purple. The red male cardinal will sing his arias to protect his territory, and bring seeds to his wife, and feed them to her.
Finally, when our frabjous days arrive, the cardinal’s redness will cease to startle and please as much, as the leafed trees, and red and purple flowers overwhelm our fields of vision.
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/42916/jabberwockyhttps://www.theparisreview.org
http://www.theotherpages.org/poems/books/tennyson/tennyson04.html