Gloriously Green - Missoula, Montana

"For in the true nature of things, if we rightly consider, every green tree is far more glorious than if it were made of gold and silver."  -Martin Luther (1483-1546)

New Green - Missoula,Montana

I'm always amazed at fresh green sprouts among the matured purple leaves on one specific tree behind our office.
I'm sure it's a normal condition for this tree variety, but I can't help the delight at such an unexpected contrast - zesty brights of spring appearing long after that season has run its course. It begets the same brand of wonder as Montana snowfall in May or September when the previous day boasted 60 degrees F. 

Unexpected, but enthralling because of the surprise. 

If we pay attention, we see micro-wonders of contrast on a daily basis - the complex geometry of a dandelion puff in the weed jungle of an empty lot, miniature bright-hued gravel gems rimming a puddle at the park, the smell of summer rain bursting through mid-July's oppressive heat canopy...Tell me your favourite eyes-wide-open glimpsed glory.

Waking Sprig - Missoula, Montana

"...Wakening from the dreaming forest there, the hazel-sprig
sang under my tongue, its drifting fragrance
climbed up through my conscious mind..."

- from Lost In the Forest by Pablo Neruda  (1904-1973)

Read the rest of this tasty poem here.

Never Too Late - Missoula, Montana

This little shock of new green caught my eye - unrepentant, these late-springing greens shall have their day in the sun along with their earlier-matured kin. 

"...Nothing is too late, till the tired heart shall cease to palpitate..."

- from Morituri Salutamus: Poem for the Fiftieth Anniversary of the Class of 1825 in Bowdoin College by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Late-Sprouting Green - Missoula, Montana

"Your heart is full of fertile seeds, waiting to sprout." 

- Morihei Ueshiba (1883-1969)

Good Life Waiting - Missoula, Montana

"We must be willing to let go of the life we planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us." 

- Joseph Campbell (1904-1987)

One Day Later - Missoula, Montana

"...Her early leaf's a flower; 
But only so an hour. 
Then leaf subsides to leaf..."

- from Nothing Gold Can Stay by Robert Frost

I kid you not - this is the same leaf cluster as pictured in yesterday's post, on one of the trees I say hello to on my mostly-daily lunchtime walk. The amazing daily changes of spring inspire toward incremental possibles - yesterday doesn't have to the same as today - and for this visible hope we are thankful.

Focused Up - Missoula, Montana

"Now the trouble about trying to make yourself stupider than you really are is that you very often succeed." - C.S. Lewis (1898-1963), The Magician's Nephew (The Chronicles of Narnia)

I could possibly stretch the 'focus up' aspect of today's spring leaves in contrast to the quote topic, but 'stretch' would be the operative word. Today's quote doesn't really have much anything to do with the picture, but it did make me laugh out loud yesterday, while listening to the audiobook during my lunchtime walk. Laughing from a place of empathy and personal experience, of course. Lewis aptly put into plain speech the fallacy of trying to make ourselves believe less than what we know to be true. And yet, we often insist on taking the long, dusty road to learning that vulnerable honesty is so much simpler than clutching tightly to our so-called pride. May Heaven help us to persist in shortening that worthwhile journey.

Sunlit Green - Missoula, Montana

"I saw the sunlight in a leafy place,

Bathing itself in liquid green and amber..."

- Ernest Rhys (1859-1946), from "April Romance", The Leaf Burners and Other Poems

New Leaves, Sunshine - Missoula, Montana

"Isn't it nice to think that tomorrow is a new a day with no mistakes in it?" 

- L.M. Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables (Anne of Green Gables, #1)

New Leaves, Fresh Hopes - Missoula, Montana

"Write it on your heart

that every day is the 

best day in the year...

This new day is too dear,

with its hopes and invitations,

to waste a moment on the yesterdays."
-  from Write It On Your Heart by Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882)

New Leaves - Missoula, Montana

"The next year, the next day, the next hour are lying ready for you, as perfect, as unspoiled, as if you had never wasted or misapplied a single moment in all your life.

You can turn over a new leaf every hour if you choose." - Arnold Bennett (1867-1931)

Fresh Green Lilac Leaves - Missoula, Montana

"...And to you, what can these mean now:...the evidence unfolding
like a flower, the green song
in the green leaves, the presence
of the sky with its goblet of freshness?..."

- from With Quevedo, In Springtime by Pablo Neruda

Mapley Goodness - Missoula, Montana

As a kid, when our family headed into town for a special treat night at the W & E drive in, I invariably agonized over choosing the best ice cream flavour for that day - but we could always count on my mum getting her standard favorite: a maple walnut sundae. Good times.

Today's pic is a whole other version of mapley goodness - a bursting, bright fountain of delicate flowerets heralds the unfurling of tender-new claret-hued maple leaves. Goodness all around - before our eyes, in our hearts' memories - ours to feast upon.