Frozen Beauty

A brief intermission from wondering what to eat next

Some winters past, when winter deigned to bless my corner of the flatlands, an eerily frosty morning inspired a bit of poetry to underscore the unwavering grace and promise of nature. A reminder of how the newness of the coming year should refresh us all. All the photography is by Dennis Becker.

Prairie hoarfrost reveals itself in the early midwinter morning while driving into the foreverness of a hazy, horizonless landscape in Nobles County, Minnesota.

So still and otherworldly, the lacy ice crystals heavily limn the edges of each leaf and twig.

Scattering the light, nearly as fleeting as the winter solstice hours, the frost this day lingers beyond the expected.

Ghostly glimmering, so ethereal; a photographer’s dream. Impossible to take a disappointing shot, with enough captures to exhaust a memory card.

“Winter is the time for comfort—it is the time for home.” Edith Sitwell

The sharp air is saturated with chilling moisture, while every surface is even colder, transforming the morning dew into interlocking feathers of ice. Drop by drop, softly icy, crystal clear.

“…the cold hoarfrost stuck to our faces like down. And the stars seemed to run toward us along the branches: they would flash, and go out again, --just as though the sky were walking round and round.” Leo Tolstoy, from a children’s fable.

Vives Annos! Cheers for an extraordinarily good new year.

And back to the kitchen on Monday…