13 December 2025 (piping the icing)
Kristen Lindquist
piping the icing
on the last batch of cookies —
Geminids
Book of Days
BOOK OF DAYS: A POET AND NATURALIST TRIES TO FIND POETRY IN EVERY DAY
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Filtering by Tag: meteor shower
13 August 2024 (beyond)
Kristen Lindquist
beyond
the bonfire sparks
meteor shower
12 August 2024 (the afterlife)
Kristen Lindquist
the afterlife of a rooster Perseids
31 December 2023 (the coyotes)
Kristen Lindquist
the coyotes fall silent meteor shower
Happy New Year! Thank you for your support of my haiku!
22 October 2022 (a flash)
Kristen Lindquist
a flash of insight
lost on waking—
Orionids
11 August 2020 (crickets)
Kristen Lindquist
meteor shower
the night air thick
with crickets
13 August 2019 (moon)
Kristen Lindquist
moonlight on water
instead of falling stars
sturgeon moon
August 8: River of Heaven
Kristen Lindquist
Night of falling stars--
how sad the Milky Way
still separates the lovers.
Although a month late by traditional reckoning, last night while we were in the backyard watching for falling stars from the Perseid meteor shower, I was thinking about Tanabata. This Japanese festival (also celebrated for centuries in China and Korea) celebrates the one night each year that two lovers, normally kept apart by the Milky Way, are allowed to meet. The two lovers--a weaver and a cowherd--are symbolized by the two bright stars Altair and Vega, visible last night directly over our house on either side of the Milky Way.
In this drought
the River of Heaven's low enough
for lovers to cross.
Posted with BlogsyDecember 13: Winter Storm Watch
Kristen Lindquist
One day before the storm
night sky clear enough
to see falling stars.
night sky clear enough
to see falling stars.
April 22: Lyrids
Kristen Lindquist
Tonight the Lyrid meteor shower peaks. But the waxing moon is too bright most of the night. And I'm not the kind of person who can wake before dawn, just after the moon has set, so I can freeze half-awake in the back yard waiting for stars to fall. Those wishes will have to remain unexpressed until the next shower of space dust.
In the moon-washed sky
Big Dipper spills onto our house
unseen meteors.
In the moon-washed sky
Big Dipper spills onto our house
unseen meteors.
December 12: Night sky
Kristen Lindquist
In the backyard tonight braving the cold for a few minutes in hope of seeing some of the Geminid meteor shower. Clear sky on a new moon night, perfect for star-gazing. This pattern of constellations is the same one I first learned as a child studying the stars with a well-thumbed Golden Book--for me, the night sky's most familiar face. Over the roof peak poise the two stars of Gemini, Castor and Pollux; Orion climbs the sky beyond my neighbor's garden; Auriga, the Charioteer, pauses high over Mount Battie; the V of Taurus the Bull sits just below the blurred cluster of the Pleiades. And almost inside that V, bright Jupiter.
With binoculars, I can see three of Jupiter's four Galilean moons--the largest and brightest satellites of our largest planet--as well as the true redness of Aldebaran, the alpha star of Taurus. I don't expect to last long enough to see an actual meteor. But as I shiver and the cloud of my breath rises to the heavens, a quick falling star flashes behind a net of birch branches. I say "Thank you!" to the sky before rushing back into the warm house.
No need to make a wish.
This sky, these stars--
all I want right now.
With binoculars, I can see three of Jupiter's four Galilean moons--the largest and brightest satellites of our largest planet--as well as the true redness of Aldebaran, the alpha star of Taurus. I don't expect to last long enough to see an actual meteor. But as I shiver and the cloud of my breath rises to the heavens, a quick falling star flashes behind a net of birch branches. I say "Thank you!" to the sky before rushing back into the warm house.
No need to make a wish.
This sky, these stars--
all I want right now.