Happy Memorial Day!

Beverly National Cemetery in Beverly, New Jersey. Click to enlarge.

Sleep the sleep that knows not waking, 

Dream of battled fields no more.  

 

from Soldier Rest! Thy Warfare o'er

by Sir Walter Scott

Lunch With the Crow

I've always had trouble photographing crows. They see me coming and despite my attempts to approach casually, they always pick up and leave before I get within snapping distance. So I was ignoring a crow one blue morning a few weeks ago as I walked to the edge of Pier 6 in Brooklyn Bridge Park. I passed the lovely wildflower meadow on Pier 6 pictured here. The crow was calling from a high perch as I reached my favorite bench. Click to enlarge.

I was not even going to try to take that crow's picture. I unwrapped the lox cream cheese bagel I'd brought for lunch.

Then I settled in to watch the boat traffic on the East River; here's a nice red tug heading north past lower Manhattan.

The next thing I knew, that crow had landed really close and was looking at me. After a minute it came closer. I thought briefly of Alfred Hitchcock's The Birds before realizing it was looking at the bagel on the bench beside me.

It turns out crows really like lox cream cheese bagels.

And they like to keep clean. Between bites, it flew to a fence railing and wiped the cream cheese off its beak.

Last seen flying toward Governor's Island. Something tells me he's going to become a regular lunch companion at Pier 6.

Happy Mother's Day

Coming Soon

I'm going to be in places without Internet service for a week or two, so I'm posting a preview of coming attractions. This crow is the subject of an upcoming blog -- maybe this Sunday but possibly the next. 

The story will also feature this delicious lox cream cheese bagel. 

And be set against the lovely background of Brooklyn Bridge Park on Pier 6.
Click to enlarge and stay tuned. 

Spring Flowers

"People from a planet without flowers would think we must be mad with joy the whole time to have such things about us." Iris Murdoch 

"Spring has returned. The Earth is like a child that knows poems by heart."
Rainer Maria  Rilke 

"The flower is the poetry of reproduction." Jean Giraudoux.