The creek starts to sing...

There's nothing like finding a shady, cool spot by a creek or a river

during the height of a hot summers day.

But going up a creek at the beginning of spring is magical.

The jumble of log jams from rushing winter waters has settled in for the time being.

The bones of bears dinners lay strewn about in the woods above the shore.

Rich salmon feasts, now a thing of the past , lay like 

puzzles waiting to be pieced together again.
The tiny vertebrae so beautiful...inspiration for Antonio Gaudi for sure!

Things; flora and fauna alike, asleep for the winter

are now awakening, feeling the dawn on leaves,

petals, slimy skin and bright green moss.

 ...the delicate trillium one of the brightest faces in the woods...

...little wine cup fungus awaiting a fairies dinner party...

...false lily of the valley, lined up, soldiering along the forest floor

Like a book being opened...a new story begins again.

Last years dipper has decided that this spot under the bridge is 

a good, safe place to nest again.
One small ball of twig and moss, now dwarfed by its latest neighbor.

The tiny winter wren, hungry for love, trills out a song as big as the forest itself.

And the water!

Truly perky, alive, dancing over rocks in sensual glides and dives.

Going where water wants to go.

Flowing with abandonment to places great and small.

Settling into pools for armies of fish fry; a safe harbor to grow.

Sunlight speckles rounded rocks polished by the waters touch.

 Ghosts in the wood, man made and nature made alike...

Someone's lost belongings blending in, reminding us of our transparency here.

A lookout perched above the banks, on call for another summer at the creek side.

So I borrow this lovely space for a short time, drenched in the singing of the creek,
watching the world begin once again...

...things watching me perhaps from the shadows of the woods...

...rock hopping like a child through velvet greens, muted by birdsong.
Who knows what treasures and surprises I'll find this time around?