Notes on Exploring the Natural World

Haiku and Prose

This offering includes some thoughts on exploring the natural world, in poetry and prose. First, I have two announcements.

Website Update

I have updated the Home Page with a new profile photograph and more usefull information about the three other pages. I have added ten new images at the end of the Ecographs page. One is a photograph of Bloodroot taken at Audubon Acres. The following nine are original artworks. The underlined words are active links.

Poetry Reading

I will read my poetry posters, also known as Broadsides, on Wednesday, June 25, at 5:30 PM, at Rev Coffee and Books in Hixson, Tennessee. I have republished four 11” by 17” posters, each featuring a poem and one of my photographs. Anyone purchasing one of my books will receive a free poster.

Haiku

A Mosquito Lands
Seeks blood for a protein meal
Soon she will lay eggs

The mosquito is gone
In a sudden swoop of wings
Bat flies home to rest

Bats that ate insects
Pile up dead beside the caves
White noses abound

If you explore wetlands
You are likely to get wet
Don't sink in the mud

Bogs quake like jello
Like a trampoline below
Don't break through and swim

People found in bogs
Like raisins in a loaf of bread
Preserved long ago.

Turtle in a bog
Stops to rest from laying eggs
Soaks up warm thin sun

Otter on a log
Mother's milk a memory
Now he hunts for fish

Daffodils return
Bees and butterflies feeding
Fewer come each year

If walking near dunes
Be careful of the dune grass
It holds them in place

Thoughts on the Nature Experience

In my recent Substack essay, “A morning at Amnicola Marsh,” I described setting up my camp chair, unpacking my binoculars, notebook, and sketchbook, and preparing for an extended stay. I used a “sit spot,” a term I first heard while participating in the Journey in Place class offered by Janisse Ray via Subtack.

Barry Lopez described a similar process in his essay “The Naturalist.” He said, “Almost every day I go down to the river with no intention but to sit and watch.” In his book Embrace Fearlessly the Burning World he described using this process when getting acquainted with a new natural area. He wrote about explorations on multiple continents and had many opportunities to use this approach.

A friend of mine in the Tourism business once informed me that people, on average, spend about 5 minutes at natural features they travel to see. The only way to extend this time is to tell them they only have five minutes. Then they will pointedly stay longer to prove you wrong. This may represent a different approach.

Nature writers from Aldo Leopold to Joseph Wood Crutch have written about this phenomenon, sometimes ridiculing those who value the itinerary above the experience. Among bird watchers, these people are called listers. I suggest seeing the film The Big Year to understand this phenomenon, but only if you enjoy comedy. It is also a book, if you are inclined to read.

Ridicule serves no good purpose. I refrain from ridicule and say I take a different approach. That is my ideal. I sometimes fail to be that kind.

When I go to a “sit spot,” I leave my camera behind. Observing nature, taking notes, and creating useful photographs simultaneously is impossible. I sit and watch. Sometimes, I take notes, but observation is preeminent.

Lopez described this phenomenon in his essay “Learning to See,” published in his book About This Life. He was on track to become a landscape photographer and a writer, but he realized he had to choose. His writing is exquisite. A sample appears on Granta’s website.

I have mentioned Lopez twice, and he is one of my favorites. Other nature writers are worth a read for their approach, especially if they are writing about the area you are investigating.

A Sand County Almanac by Aldo Leopold is a classic. Anyone reading about or exploring the natural world will eventually encounter it. Leopold began with a seasonal exploration of a rundown farm and the surrounding area in Wisconsin’s Sand Counties. He followed that with Sketches Here and There, his story of other natural areas he had visited. In the third section, “The Upshot,” he wrote eloquently about the ethics and aesthetics of using natural areas.

In The Outermost House, Henry Beston took the same seasonal approach in a coastal area. His house on Cape Cod was a literary landmark, but the winds and ocean washed it away.

For those living in the Southeast, Southern nature writing abounds. Elemental South and The Woods Stretched for Miles are anthologies from the University of Georgia Press. Several of the authors have widely available books.

I have written about several Southern nature writers in my Substack publication. Here are a few links.

Franklin Burroughs: Bard of the Coastal Plain is my brief review of a South Carolina author’s works.

I look at Chattanooga nature authors in Writing Chattanooga: Southern by Nature.

In Roots of Southern Nature Writing, I briefly examine Bartram, Michaux, and Catesby in case you haven’t heard of them.

The Poetry of Robert Sparks Walker is one of many articles I wrote about the founder of the Chattanooga Audubon Society.

I hope you will find time to explore the natural world through observation and literature. On the day described in “A morning at Amnicola Marsh,” I sat for two hours or more at Amnicola Marsh. I lose track of time when I am “in the flow.”

I saw Red-winged Blackbirds, two Wood Duck families, and a Canada Goose family up close. Further out, Green and Great Blue Herons flew by. An Osprey descended and flew off with a fish.

If you want to understand the natural world, consider getting a sit spot. Joseph Cornell gives instructions in his book Listening to Nature. He warns against expecting a parade of animals, but admits that it happens sometimes.