#it’s falling into the Rappahannock….. | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

realtorjamier · 11 months ago

Text

Best Places Around the Area to See Fall Foliage!

Autumn’s natural glory will soon be ablaze with color, making it a great time to plan your leaf-peeping. Mid-October is generally the best time to start seeking out fall foliage, and the colors can continue well into November. For an animated map showing the progression of color across the U.S., check out this online illustration from The Farmer’s Almanac.

So where should you go locally to experience autumn at its finest? Here we offer some of the best spots in the DMV for photographing fall scenery – whether it’s for dynamic social media posts, placing your pictures in a frame, or just taking snapshots with your mind.

Tidal Basin

Washington, D.C.

Spanning 107 acres, but just 10 feet deep, the Tidal Basin is well known for its lovely cherry blossoms in the spring, but in the fall these same trees turn a beautiful orange and gold! Enjoy a stroll around an easy two-mile loop.

Theodore Roosevelt Island

George Washington Memorial Parkway Arlington, VA

A two-mile path follows the island’s shore, moving into the swamp and tidal inlet where nature frames views of Washington, D.C. Buy the book “Finding Solace at Theodore Roosevelt Island” by Melanie Choukas-Bradley for an even more meaningful meander.

State Arboretum of Virginia

Blandy Experimental Farm Boyce, VA

Virginia’s State Arboretum spans 172 acres of tree and shrub collections dating back to the early 1930s. You can also experience the glorious golden 300 tree Ginkgo grove every fall.

Georgetown’s Cobblestone neighborhoods

Georgetown, D.C.

Georgetown is renowned for federalist architecture, cobblestone streets, and historic brick and frame row houses, some of which date to the mid-1700s. It’s also an origination point for the historic C & O Canal, a National Park which runs 184.5 miles into Cumberland, Md. Enjoy a fall stroll and consider taking a guided tour.

Rock Creek Park

Washington, D.C.

Created in 1890, Rock Creek Park is the oldest urban park in the National Park Service. Its 1,754 acres generally follows the Potomac River tributary of Rock Creek and includes a golf course, equestrian trails, an amphitheater, and picnic and playground facilities. It also includes Peirce Mill, a water-powered grist mill built in the 1820s.

Seneca Creek State Park

Gaithersburg, MD

More than 50 miles of trails wind through a variety of habitat, including the 90-acre Clopper Lake. A restored 19th-century cabin adds charm to your fall photographs.

Great Falls Park

McLean, VA

Three overlooks within a short walk front the Great Falls Park Virginia Visitor Center allow for spectacular scenery. Two of the overlooks are handicap and stroller accessible.

Great Falls Park

Potomac, MD

Visit the Great Falls Tavern Visitor Center on the Maryland side of Great Falls Park, located at mile 14.3 along the C&O Canal towpath in Montgomery County, Md.

Shenandoah National Park

Luray, VA

Located in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Va., the park stretches 105 miles from the northern entrance in Front Royal to the southern entrance near Waynesboro. Skyline Drive is the main road running the span of the park – a scenic byway that can get especially busy during peak leaf-peeping times.

Harpers Ferry National Historical Park

Harpers Ferry, WV

Almost Heaven, but just a hop, skip, and a jump from the D.C. Metro area, Harpers Ferry is a time capsule nestled in the Blue Ridge mountains where the Shenandoah and Potomac rivers come together and continue eastward to the Chesapeake Bay as the Potomac river. Unfortunately, this fall’s rockslide stabilization project will make the travel to Harpers Ferry a bit tricky, so check your options online or through your favorite phone app.

South Mountain State Park

Boonsboro, MD

This 40-mile park weaves along South Mountain Ridge. Visitors can walk the same paths as the Civil War soldiers who fought at the 1862 Battle of South Mountain, climbing to enjoy breathtaking views.

Rappahannock River Heritage Trail

Fredericksburg, VA

This paved pathway makes for an easy walk, but don’t let the pavement fool you – beautiful views of the Rappahannock River, Old Mill Park, and several historic mills are seen throughout the trail.

#jamierichards #realtorjamier #realestatetips #realestate #realestateagent #realtor #fall #fall foliage #dmv #dmv fall #dmv fall foliage

0 notes

quicksiluers · 3 years ago

Photo

Ok so that 2021 book list I mentioned earlier...it turned into 30 books because I have no self control 😬but here they are, my favorite books I read in 2021! And yeah, all of them civil war related cause what would you expect?

below the cut, I’ve included all the names with the authors so if you wanna check them out, you can!

Nothing But Victory: The Army of the Tennessee, 1861- 1865 (Steven E. Woodworth)

Raising the White Flag: How Surrender Defined the American Civil War (David Sikenat)

Thunder at the Gates: The Black Civil War Regiments that Redeemed America (Douglas R. Egerton)

American Brutus: John Wilkes Booth and the Lincoln Conspiracies

This Republic of Suffering: Death and the American Civil War (Drew Gilpin Faust)

The War of the Common Soldier: How Men Thought, Fought, and Survived in Civil War Armies (Peter S. Carmichael)

The Howling Storm, Weather, Climate, and the American Civil War (Kenneth W. Noe)

An Environmental History of the Civil War (Judkin Browning)

Meade at Gettysburg: A Study in Command (Kent Masterson Brown)

Lincoln on the Verge: Thirteen Days to Washington (Ted Widmer)

Major General George H. Sharpe and the Creation of American Military Intelligence in the Civil War (Peter G. Tsouras)

Radical Sacrifice: The Rise & Ruin of Fitz John Porter (William Marvel)

Midnight in America: Darkness, Sleep, and Dreams During the Civil War (Jonathan W. White)

Rites of Retaliation: Civilization, Soldiers, and Campaigns in the American Civil War (Lorien Foote)

Let Us Have Peace: Ulysses S. Grant and the Politics of War & Reconstruction, 1861 - 1868 (Brooks D. Simpson)

Sickles at Gettysburg: The Controversial Civil War General Who Committed Murder, Abandoned Little Round Top, and Declared Himself The Hero of Gettysburg (James A. Hessler)

Timothy B. Smith:

Champion Hill: Decisive Battle for Vicksburg

The Union Assaults at Vicksburg, May 17 – 22, 1863

The Siege of Vicksburg: Climax of the Campaign to Open the Mississippi River, May 23 – Jay 4, 1863

Caroline E. Janney:

Remembering the Civil War: Reunion & the Limits of Reconciliation

Ends of War: The Unfinished Fight of Lee’s Army After Appomattox

Elizabeth R. Varon:

Appomattox: Victory, Defeat, and Freedom at the End of the Civil War

Southern Lady, Yankee Spy: The True Story of Elizabeth Van Lew, a Union Agent in the Heart of the Confederacy

Jeffrey Wm Hunt:

Meade & Lee After Gettysburg: From Falling Waters to Culpeper Court House

Meade & Lee at Bristoe Station

Meade & Lee at Rappahannock Station

Petersburg campaign books:

The Siege of Petersburg: The Battles for the Weldon Railroad, August 1865 (John Horn)

Richmond Redeemed: The Siege at Petersburg, the Battles of Chaffin’s Bluff and Poplar Spring Church, September 29 – October 2, 1864

Richmond Must Fall: The Richmond Petersburg Campaign, October 1864 (Hampton Newsome)

A Campaign of Giants: The Battle for Petersburg Vol. 1 (A. Wilson Greene)

#my ramblings #self control? don't know her #also i love all these covers but that ricmond must fall cover lol #i love that book but the cover is just!! not great #2021 books

12 notes · View notes

thenativetank · 3 years ago

Text

VA Native Fish Hunting - 2

Me and the wife went out fish hunting this past weekend and had a VERY eventful trip! This one is actually a little longer than usual because I have a lot to say on it :-P so, you’ve been warned!

So this week we tried to explore a creek and a pond that were both within about 10 minutes of the house. Fun story though - Google Maps doesn’t actually tell you when a body of water falls within private property lines. Whoops. We ended up going with our third choice, which was to kayak on the Rappahannock River. Immediately, things were off to a great start.

Very soon after parking, we came across some Chinese Mystery/Apple Snail (Cipangopaludina chinensis) shells! Very obviously an introduced species, I had heard that they were seen at a local beach years back but I was never able to find any. So this was a cool find. Wait...

Borderline scary. We found hundreds of shells there, many about this size. That is an invasive species for you!

Lots of different marsh plants here - some Nuphar spp. Lotuses on display and one of my faves, the Pickerelweed (shown above). That said, I almost always mistake them for Saggitaria species until I see the nice purple flowers. Still, a cool species.

We checked multiple sites on this trip and the only submerged plant we saw was Hydrilla (okay and like one 2 inch strand of hornwort). How do you tell the difference between Hydrilla (which is invasive) and our native Elodea/Anacharis? Look at the number of leaves per whorl. Hydrilla has 2 to 8 spined leaves per whorl and Elodea/Anacharis usually has 3 smooth leaves. For aquarium purposes, both are fine - but I discarded these because of possible mystery snail contaminants.

We saw a bunch of very weird things swimming in the water (and not very well); both of us immediately and separately came to the conclusion of some Devonian-looking sea critter. Turns out they are Dragonfly nymphs! We saw tons here of different species. I collected some shells and are drying them now. I’ll make a shadowbox with some of our preserved Dragonfly adults later. Okay but now for the fish!

Ended up catching 6 Mosquitofish (Gambusia holbrooki). A very common species that is pretty easy to catch with a dip net because they congregate at the surface. In larger tanks they are pretty mellow; I hear in small tanks they are terrors.

A bit more interesting is this guy! While dipping for Mosquitofish I managed to unknowingly snag this Mummichog (Fundulus heteroclitus). Even at this small 2 inch size, he’s got very lovely blue markings all over and vivid yellow markings on the end of his fins. Out and about from day one, I definitely love this little dude! He’ll get to be about 6 inches at maximum, but I don’t expect much more than 4.

A little backstory here. I also set up a killifish trap near some reeds at the shoreline to see what I could catch, using the only bait I had on hand... leftover tortilla and egg from a breakfast burrito. Imagine my surprise when I caught two Banded Killifish (Fundulus diaphanus)! Well, maybe/sort of.

This is where things get tricky! I caught two males which look a bit “off” from my current male Banded Killie. The colors are deeper, their dorsal and anal fins have additional spotting, and they both have white markings on their heads over their eyes. Part of me wonders if these are due to hybridization with the Mummichog. They have been known to interbreed where their ranges overlap and these guys are both a) different from my current one, and b) very similar to each other. I’m ruling out regional variants because all were caught from the Rappahannock, just different access points. I’ve taken to calling them Bandichogs.

Anyways, it was a super fun trip - I’m glad to have a lot to talk about here!

#nanf #native fish #killifish #banded killifish #mummichog #fishcommunity #fishblr #fish hunts

24 notes · View notes

feverdreamhigh · 5 years ago

Text

PSA so you don’t get your hopes up like i did 😢

You can’t win hot 99.5′s Summer Bucks sweepstakes (the one where you can win tickets to see a secret Taylor performance in NYC) if you don’t live in the District of Columbia (DC) or one of the following counties from Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and West Virginia:

Maryland

Allegany

Calvert

Charles

Frederick

Montgomery

Prince George’s

St. Mary’s

Washington

Pennsylvania

Fulton

Virginia:

Alexandria City

Arlington

Clarke

Culpeper

Fairfax

Falls Church City

Fauquier

Frederick

Fredericksburg City

King George

Loudon

Manassas City

Page

Prince William

Rappahannock

Shenandoah

Spotsylvania

Stafford

Warren

Westmoreland

Winchester City

West Virginia:

Berkeley

Grant

Hampshire

Hardy

Jefferson

Mineral

Morgan

source

#taylor swift #NYC #summer bucks sweepstakes #hot 99.5

3 notes · View notes

nylonsandlipstick · 7 years ago

Note

I'm not doubting you about the 'cs lewis wasn't racist' but can you share the receipts so that I can use them when people argue w me about this?

Absolutely!!!

The thing about the racism claim is it’s mislabeling what Lewis truly did. Do I approve of how Lewis portrayed the Calormene as a whole? No. But is it racism? Not at all. What Lewis shows us is more of a cultural insensitivity which is still common to this day. There’s a really big difference between cultural insensitivity sprung up by ignorance and just straight up racism. And labeling everything racism really begins to dilute the meaning of the word until it hardly means anything to anyone it should impact.

So, to start: the meaning of the word racism. The Merriam-Webster dictionary defines it as “a belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race,” race being defined as “a category of humankind that shares certain distinctive physical traits.” So now we know what we need to look for.

Knowing the definitions, if you actually read The Chronicles of Narnia thoroughly you’ll see that racism isn’t brought up and that any prejudices against the Calormene people doesn’t have to do with their skin color or their culture (at least, their culture as a whole). What I mean by the culture “as a whole” is that while Lewis isn’t prejudiced against the whole of the Calormene people, he does make some differences between Calormen and Narnia to make Calormen the foil for Narnia, specifically in the religious aspect.

What a lot of people can’t seem to wrap their heads around is the fact that Lewis was Christian and he really did try to incorporate Christianity into his books (although into Narnia unintentionally at first) and while I see that a lot of people understand this to a degree, they don’t fully comprehend it and don’t really see it in his writings. With the Susan aspects, people think that because Lewis is a Christian, he’s saying that femininity is godless and in turn that makes him a sexist because women can’t be feminine. All of that is untrue.

In the aspect of the Calormen religion, Lewis didn’t make them a nation of “non-Aslan believers” just to hate on them and their faith. Lewis grew up in a Christian household, lost his faith during his early adulthood, became a pagan, and when he returned to Christianity he was “kicking, struggling, resentful and darting his eyes in every direction for a chance to escape” (Surprised by Joy: The Shape of My Early Life; 1955). Lewis knows different faiths, he’s not some guy who spent his entire life as a steadfast Christian with no doubt in the world and one to ostracize non-Christians. He doesn’t look at the Calormene in a hateful, anti-Christian view, but instead as a people that believe in what he thinks to be the same things as the Narnians just differently (I’ll get into what I mean by that in a bit) and are ruled by poor leaders (at least that we see of in the books, I don’t remember clearly if Calormen ever had any very admirable leaders that were liked throughout Narnia).

What I like about Lewis is that he acknowledges that question of “if I believe in x deity, what happens to the other people that believe in y deity?” (it’s such a deep and philosophical question that any theologian asks themselves at least once in their lifetime and a great use of soteriology). He not only acknowledges that deep theological question but also basically states his whole view of Calormen in this one quote from The Last Battle:

“I and [Tash] are of such different kinds that no service which is vile can be done to me, and none which is not vile can be done to him.”

This basically means that those who worship Tash and are virtuous and good people are actually worshiping Aslan, and those who are immoral and who worship Aslan are in fact worshiping Tash. So, not only does this establish Aslan as a greater and mightier being in the Narnia universe (considering all of the other minor deities, I see him as God but with a Zeus-like council of other gods, more Mount Olympus-esque) and Tash as the more evil of the two (I don’t think he’s necessarily Satan but more of a hateful being) but it also shows that Lewis doesn’t view the Calormene people as villainous or even erroneous for their faith in Tash, more as if Tash was just their Calormene name for Aslan (as God has several different names depending on the language). It also doesn’t make the Calormene people villainous, only full of people who could be virtuous and people who could be immoral as any kingdom in any place could be. He essentially humanizes them and addresses gray areas instead of making it all black and white by having one people be good (the Narnians) and another be bad (the Caloremene).

Seeing as Lewis really heavily focuses on the Christian aspect of his books, I really do think it resonates in his books that he doesn’t have this whole idea of “these are the Christians and these essentially are Satan-worshipers” especially how he took a lot of inspiration for Calormen from the Middle East and bits from Central Asia.

Why I include this argument is because there are arguments against the Calormene faith being seen as one of the major points in the counterargument for Lewis’s alleged racism. Seeing as Calormen is inspired from the Middle East and the Middle East is predominantly Islamic, a lot of people also see this as rather perverted anti-Islamic propaganda. Which is wrong. Because the only reason why the Calormene religion would be at all similar to Islam is because of any influence pre-Muhammad religions may have had on Islam which more so boils down to culture and less to actual belief systems. I remember reading once, I can’t pinpoint exactly where, most likely on the Wikipedia page of something to do with Calormen or The Horse and His Boy, that the Calormen religion is most likely influenced by early Canaanite and Carthaginian religions, the Carthaginian religion just being more of a Phoenician continuation of the Canaanite religion. This makes sense since all three religions are polytheistic and require sacrifices, specifically of the human kind (although last I read, it hasn’t been completely confirmed that human sacrifices were done for the Canaanite religion; it’s been confirmed that the Carthaginian religion did, in fact, practice human sacrifices, even that of children) and the Calormene religion even follows how the Canaanite religion was polytheistic yet monolatristic (this coming from the word monolatry which is the belief of many gods, i.e. polytheism, but with a more consistent worship of only one deity). I believe the reasons why the Canaanite and Carthaginian religions are more likely to be Lewis’s inspiration for the Calormene religion were because of G.K. Chesterton’s book The Everlasting Man (a book that Lewis wholly admired) and E. Nesbit’s depiction of Babylon (this I especially see in Lewis’s cultural development of the Calormene in their use of “Tisroc” as the name for their ruler, and their use of “may he live forever” whenever the Tisroc is mentioned).

Now, to move away from the religious aspect, Lewis really doesn’t portray any racism because there’s no hate against the Calormene people coming from the Narnians (who the narrative paints as a great nation with few flaws when controlled by the Narnians or the Pevensies). When Susan and Edmund go to Calormen in The Horse and His Boy, they don’t portray any racist ideologies. They’re not hateful toward any of the Calormene, they’re not grossly rude. They just find it an odd kingdom and that’s about it. It’s different from Narnia, Narnia which is full of what should be mythical creatures and talking animals and few humans.

The Narnians and Archenlanders happily accept Aravis, a Calormene noblegirl, and even marries Cor, a boy who seems to fall more under that European-inspired ethnicity. Not only did Lewis write Aravis out to be a heroic character, she’s also in a mixed relationship which was still heavily frowned upon and unaccepted in 1954 when the book was published. Nowadays we don’t blink at an interracial relationship (well, most of us anyways) but just to put it into perspective, the Supreme Court of the United States didn’t legalize interracial marriages throughout the entire U.S. until 1967, over 10 years after the case of Loving v. Virginia which actually imprisoned a white man and a woman of color (she identified as Indian-Rappahannock but was reported as also being Cherokee, Portuguese, and African American) for marrying because it was against Virginia’s anti-miscegenation laws. So, it’s pretty obvious that Lewis was very ahead of his times in that one aspect that seems so minuscule to us now.

On to other Calormene characters that were depicted well, we also have Lasaraleen and Emeth. Lasaraleen is a frivolous girl who cares more about dresses and dinners than fighting but she’s not evil. She’s not seen as less than the Narnian or Archenlandan(?) characters because of her skin color. She’s scared and frivolous but a good friend to Aravis who helps her escape Tashbaan so that she can continue her journey to Narnia. Whether you see her personality as being sexist is a different argument, but it’s blatantly obvious that Lewis doesn’t see her in a racist manner. She can actually be a bit admirable if you like that she pushed through her fears to help a friend escape to safety.

Emeth is one of my favorite examples as to how progressive and forward-thinking Lewis really was and this is going to veer a little bit away from the race aspect but it’ll really emphasize what Lewis was truly trying to do with Calormen by depicting it the way he did. Emeth is a Calormene officer who is very devoted to Tash, which Aslan later reveals to actually be a devotion to Him through his noble motives. By having Aslan accept Emeth into His Country even though he believed he was worshiping Tash in specific, Lewis is depicting Inclusivism. Inclusivism has two fields of thought which basically boil down to either a) the Traditional kind which states that a believer’s own views are absolutely true and believers of other religions insofar as long as they agree with that believer or b) the Relativistic Inclusivism which states that there are Absolute Truths and while no living human has yet to establish those Absolute Truths, all of humanity has partially established those Absolute Truths. I’m going to say that Lewis leans more towards the Relativistic Inclusivism in terms of Emeth. For more conservative and traditional Christians, it’s such a wild ideology to follow and has actually caused controversy within the Christian community for Lewis to have put into his books. I don’t think it helps that Emeth’s name means “truth” in Hebrew and was probably Lewis’s way of saying “this is what I believe to be true.” What I’m trying to say with all of this is that Lewis could have used a pagan white-European-inspired kingdom to depict this ideal, he could have made up a kingdom that was Viking- or Anglo-Saxon or whatever-inspired to depict that idea of Inclusivism. He could have completely left out Emeth from the plot and have used a different moment or a different book to portray Inclusivism. And yet he didn’t. He purposely chose a good man from a Middle Eastern-inspired kingdom who believed in a deity from a polytheistic yet monolastric faith and used him as an example for an ideology that’s not anti-Christian due to it’s actual Biblical support yet still so controversial within the Christian community.

I think that’s all I’ve got for now. It feels like I’m picking out small things but with Lewis he didn’t seem to write anything he didn’t feel was important to the plot (and actually important, not J.K. Rowling-type “important”) so there’s not much to actually go on in terms of anything Calormene. I think the reason why people want to claim racism is because nobody wants to delve deep into Lewis’s writing because they’ll end up face-to-face with his ideologies and they’re not easy more many people to stomach, whether Christian or atheist. They’re radical in Lewis’s veracity in his belief in them but they’re so non-traditional and more progressive than most of us in the twenty-first century will claim to be. I know there are a lot of people like Philip Pullman, who’s an outspoken atheist critic, and J.K. Rowling, who will say that they get that his Narnia books are Christian but won’t take the time to dissect it as a Christian piece and instead take the stories out of context and put it to modern day standards. I don’t know if it’s just because he’s a Christian writing in the mid-twentieth century, apparently too close to our times and ideologies and too far from the more conservative and bigoted ideologies of the earlier decades and centuries for us to be able to put his books up to our current views and standards, but I know for sure if someone like Jane Austen had written anything like the Narnia books, there wouldn’t be such an outcry for racism and sexism and etc. I mean, look at Oscar Wilde. He’s idolized for his literature and his sexuality yet everyone brushes over his gross antisemitism.

Anyways, I’m rambling and this has already been long enough. I hope this helped! If I find anything more that I can add to this argument I definitely will. If you have any more questions or there’s something else you want to ask about, you’re totally welcome to as well!

#this was so damn long #but I'm officially back #I think #c s lewis #meta #asks #hit me

129 notes · View notes

sjecblogarchive · 3 years ago

Text

FROM THE GREEN CORNER:COMPOST YOUR LEAVES & EAT YOUR PUMPKIN

11/27/2021

BY SJECWARRENTON

FROM THE GREEN CORNER:COMPOST YOUR LEAVES & EAT YOUR PUMPKIN!

Don’t send raked leaves and branches to the landfill. Find a place for composting where the valuable organic material enriches the soil. More tips here from Friends of the Rappahannock:

https://riverfriends.org/fall-landscaping-tips/

And what do you do with that large pumpkin that’s been on your porch since Halloween? For centuries, pumpkins were grown because they were an important food source that could last well into the winter without refrigeration. Don’t throw it out but make these delicious meatless burgers with the nutritious flesh.

PUMPKIN BURGERS (makes 12-14 burgers)

4 C. baked, mashed pumpkin, seeds removed

2 cans black beans, drained

2 C. oat flour (or oatmeal thrown into the blender)

1 t. salt

1 T. chili powder

2 T. dried chopped onion

Mix all together in a bowl. Let the mixture sit 10 minutes so oat flour soaks up the liquid. Using a 1/3 C. measure, scoop the mixture into balls onto a baking sheet. Flatten into a burger shape. These can be frozen until needed.

To cook: put a bit of oil into a pan, drop the burger in, cook through and brown gently. Serve it on a bun with a little ketchup or tajini and some greens.

SONG FOR AUTUMN

by Mary Oliver

Don’t you imagine the leaves dream now

how comfortable it will be to touch

the earth instead of the

nothingness of the air and the endless

freshets of wind? And don’t you think

the trees, especially those with

mossy hollows, are beginning to look for

the birds that will come—six, a dozen—to sleep

inside their bodies? And don’t you hear

the goldenrod whispering goodbye,

the everlasting being crowned with the first

tuffets of snow? The pond

stiffens and the white field over which

the fox runs so quickly brings out

its long blue shadows. The sind wags

its many tails. And in the evening

the piled firewood shifts a little,

longing to be on its way.

#General #Green Team #Green Corner

0 notes

sunflowerseedsandscience · 7 years ago

Text

By the Dim and Flaring Lamps: Part Three, Chapter Three

NOTE: THIS IS THE SECOND CHAPTER THAT I HAVE POSTED TODAY. You can read the one directly before it at the link above.

AUGUST 1863 WEST OF FREDERICKSBURG, VIRGINIA

As luck would have it, during the week that Mulder has spent in Fredericksburg, the Army of the Potomac has marched further south, stopping at the Rappahannock River. As a result, instead of the half-day's travel on horseback that it took him and Scully to get to Charles Spender's house at the start of the week, today, he will only need to travel for an hour or so. He has, of course, neglected to mention this to his parents; the idea of being forced to sit and listen to his father's strictures and his mother's pleading for any longer than absolutely necessary is enough to set his teeth on edge.

It's a warm morning, but not yet uncomfortable, and he meets almost no one else on the road. With the army so close, civilian travel is strongly discouraged; special papers are often required in order to pass from one town to another, and some soldiers are less cordial and gentlemanly than others when it comes to dealing with Virginian citizens.

Of course, it's not exactly safe for a soldier from either side to be riding alone, either, given the number of opportunistic thieves roving the countryside. And it's particularly dangerous for Union soldiers, at the moment, with Mosby's Raiders leaving the rebel army to go marauding north of Lee's encampment. Mulder hopes, not for the first time, that Scully had managed to make it back to the regiment without any trouble.

Near the end of his ride, about twenty miles away from Fredericksburg, Mulder passes through a picket line, marking the outer boundaries of the Union army's encampment. He's let through with relatively little hassle- the men are from his own brigade and recognize him immediately- and passes through three brigades before he manages to locate his own.

Further along, just out of sight of the picket lines, there's a group of men whiling away the morning by playing a game of four-to-a-side baseball, their jackets lying abandoned in a heap behind their makeshift home plate. Mulder stops to watch for a moment. The players are making do with a pitcher and three basemen; the men waiting to bat for the other team are taking it in turns to retrieve the pitches that the batter misses. Mulder wonders, for a moment, whether being a colonel means that he's supposed to be "above" joining in the games with his men. He resolves then and there to not give a damn if it's considered proper or not; he loves baseball, and during the long months of winter encampment they'll endure starting in December of January, it will be a welcome diversion- not to mention a way to keep warm.

He wonders whether Scully has ever played baseball before. There's a decent chance that she has, if she's grown up with two brothers and is as much of a tomboy as she's said that she was. And if she's never played... well, he'll just have to teach her.

Another few minutes' ride brings Mulder into the encampment itself. He stops to ask the colonel of each regiment where the Third Brigade is currently encamped, and before too long, he spies the red Maltese Cross of his brigade fluttering in the breeze above headquarters. Mulder decides to stop for a moment and see Colonel Skinner, before he continues on to his own regiment. He tells himself, firmly, that he's only doing it to make sure that his superior knows that he's returned, and to see if there is anything that he needs to know about, any upcoming orders that he'll need to get his men ready to carry out.

It's not because he's putting off seeing Scully again. Of course it's not.

Colonel Skinner is sitting under an awning in front of his tent, bent over a table with several members of his staff. He looks up as Mulder arrives and dismounts, then stands to return Mulder's salute.

"Welcome back, Colonel Mulder," he says. "Is your family well?"

"They are, Sir," says Mulder. "I appreciate being given the time away to see them. Thank you for that." Skinner waves this off.

"It wasn't a problem at all. It's certainly not as though anything is going on around here, at the moment."

"Before I return to my regiment, Sir, might I ask how things are standing right now? Will we be moving out anytime soon, do you think?"

"Doesn't seem very likely," says Skinner, sitting back down in his chair. He gestures away south, in the direction of the Rappahannock River, lying out of sight some two or three miles away. "General Lee's got his entire army on the southern bank of the Rappahannock, and we're sitting over here on the other side... and it doesn't look as though anyone has any plans to do anything. For the moment, we're just waiting, running drills daily to keep the men occupied, and having our sharpshooters take it in turns to keep watch along the riverbank, especially at night." He turns back to Mulder. "And speaking of sharpshooters, where's your Lieutenant Scully? We'll need him to take his turn on the watch, if you can spare him for a bit. Didn't he go to Fredericksburg with you?"

"He did, but he left much earlier than I did," says Mulder, alarmed. "You haven't seen him back here yet?"

"No," says Skinner, "but I've been close to my tent all morning. For all I know, he's waiting for you with the rest of your men." Mulder nods.

"If that's all, Sir, I'll be getting back to my regiment," he says, and Skinner returns his salute and waves him away. Mulder salutes, climbs back up on his horse, and continues on until at last, he spies the regimental colors of the Eighty-Third Pennsylvania.

The men who are gathered in his regiment's camp send up a loud cheer as he rides through, which he acknowledges, with not a small amount of discomfort. He doesn't feel quite right accepting praise from the entire regiment, not just yet, not before he's led them into battle and has proven himself to be capable of having command of so many men. But still, he waves back as the men salute him and call out to him, all the while keeping a sharp eye out for Scully's distinctive red hair.

By the time that he's reached the tent that his men have pitched for him, however, Scully is still nowhere to be found, and Mulder is becoming genuinely concerned. Scully had said that she was returning directly to the regiment, he recalls, but it's not outside the realm of possibility that she had changed her mind and had decided to spend the week elsewhere, instead. But where would she go? The roads aren't safe for anyone riding alone, not with bands of robbers and brigands waiting to attack the unaware.

His stomach gives a sudden, awful lurch when it occurs to him that, in the course of a highway robbery, Scully's attackers could discover, all too easily, the secret that she's managed to keep hidden from the entire Union army. And if that were to happen, the danger would not just be to whatever meager valuables and money she might have stashed away in her haversack. He resolves that, if Scully hasn't shown up within the hour, he will send runners to the other regiments to find out if anyone has seen her. Her hair, thankfully, makes her easy for people to remember.

And if she hasn't shown up by nightfall, Mulder will ride out in search of her himself.

Mulder dismounts and hands his horse off to be wiped down and fed. He ducks into his tent and discovers, much to his surprise, that a cot has been placed inside. He thinks that he remembers seeing one in Skinner's tent, when he had been colonel of the regiment, so maybe it had just taken some time for one to be located for him. Whatever the reason, he's glad of its presence now, and throwing his haversack to the ground, he sinks down onto the cot with a groan. It's a far cry from his accommodations of the past week, but it's a solid step above sleeping on the ground, so he'll take it.

The tent flap is suddenly thrown back, and Mulder sits upright with a start. Scully is standing just outside, peering in, squinting in the lower light. Mulder's gut unclenches at the sight of her, and his relief is strong enough to leave him light-headed.

"Permission to enter, Sir?" Scully asks stiffly, and inwardly, Mulder grimaces at the formality.

"Of course you can come in, Scully," he says. "It's your tent, too."

"Not officially," she says, but all the same, she steps inside, allowing the flap of canvas to fall closed behind her. She raises her eyebrows at the cot, and Mulder ducks his head sheepishly.

"I didn't request this, I promise," he says. "It was all set up when I got here a few minutes ago. I'll have a word with Colonel Skinner and see if I can get you one, as well."

"No, don't," Scully says. "That would likely raise a few eyebrows. Lieutenants don't usually sleep on cots, do they?"

"I don't think so," admits Mulder. "Well, you can take this one, then. I don't mind sleeping on the ground."

"It's your cot, Mulder. You're the senior officer. Why would you give it to me?"

"Because I'm a gentleman, and it's the polite thing to do," Mulder says. "Isn't it?" Scully narrows her eyes at him.

"Not when the person you're offering the better sleeping arrangement to is your subordinate," she says. She lowers her voice. "This is the sort of thing I was talking about, when I said you might treat me differently."

"But still," Mulder protests, "I don't feel right about it. At the very least, we should trade off nights." Scully sighs.

"If I agree, will you promise to shut up about the damn cot?" she asks, rolling her eyes. "I've been back at camp for all of five minutes, and already you're making me wish that I'd just deserted, instead." Mulder's heart sinks... but then he sees the glint of mischief in Scully's eyes. He grins at her, relieved.

"Fine, we trade off nights," he agrees. Scully nods and drops her gear next to Mulder's, then sits down beside him on the cot. "Where'd you go, Scully?" Mulder asks her. "You told me that you were returning to the regiment, but Colonel Skinner says he never saw you come back." Scully ducks her head.

"I didn't," she admits. "I started riding back the way we'd come, but...." She sighs. "I needed some time to cool down, after I left Fredericksburg, and I wasn't ready to come back and face the regiment, and have to come up with some phony explanation about why I wasn't still with you and your family." She glances up at him. "What did you tell them, by the way?"

"I said that we had a rider in the night, with a message calling you away," Mulder says. "I left it at that. Samantha was disappointed when you were gone at breakfast, I'll tell you that much."

"I'm sorry that I didn't get to spend more time with her," Scully says. "I feel like she and I were getting along really well." She twists her fingers awkwardly in her lap. "Mulder, I feel like I owe you an apology," she says. "Those were some terrible accusations that I was throwing around, and I shouldn't have said anything unless I knew for sure what was going on."

Mulder opens his mouth to tell her about what had happened, that last night... and stops. He's suddenly reluctant to share what happened between him and Diana last night, and it's only in part- a small part- because he doesn't like admitting that he might have been wrong.

While it's true that Mulder doesn't want to prejudice Scully against Diana more than she already is, if it turns out that the conversation in the alleyway- as well as last night's events- were innocent, it just feels... wrong, somehow, to tell Scully what had nearly happened in his bedroom last night. And it's not just because Scully is a woman; after all, hadn't they touched on the subject of intimacy briefly, right after their arrival in Fredericksburg? One way or another, Diana's advances are not something he wants to share with her, just now. He goes with a different tack, instead.

"I owe you an apology as well, Scully," he tells her. "You were right about one thing: Diana could have been a good deal more welcoming than she was, and I should have stepped up and said something to her about it."

"It could have made your visit less pleasant," Scully counters. "She didn't have any warning that I would be there, after all."

"Well, my visit was less pleasant anyway, because you weren't there," Mulder says, and Scully ducks her head, blushing. "And maybe if I had just taken the time to explain her a little bit better, you wouldn't have been so upset by the way she acted. Diana's... she's used to getting what she wants, used to having things done the way she wants them to be. I'm not saying that it's an excuse, but she's always been easily upset when plans change at the last second. I should have written ahead that you were coming with me, and I'm sorry that I didn't." He reaches out, tentatively, and covers her hand on the cot with his own. "Do you think that you can find it in your heart to forgive me?" She smiles at him, still blushing. He's charmed by the way that her freckles stand out against the pink of her cheeks.

"If you can forgive me for jumping to such offensive conclusions about your fiancee," she says.

"Scully, there's nothing to forgive," he tells her, and he means it. "You were only looking out for me, the way that you're supposed to do- as my lieutenant, and as my friend." They sit in silence a moment longer, and Mulder discovers that he doesn't want to take his hand away from Scully's. She doesn't seem in any great hurry to move, either, and so they sit quietly on the cot, not holding hands, exactly, but enjoying the connection.

"So... you never told me where you went, when you left Fredericksburg," Mulder reminds her.

"Nowhere special, really," says Scully. "For maybe half an hour, right after leaving, the idea honestly did cross my mind to just ride north, to go home and give this up, whatever happens." Mulder turns to face her fully, alarmed, and she twists her hand upwards so that they're properly holding hands, and gives his fingers a reassuring squeeze. "I decided against that pretty quickly, though. Aside from not being ready to face my mother just yet, I knew that if I left the regiment, there would be a decent chance that you and I might never see each other again."

"Not to mention, the lovely Dr. Waterston would be waiting to force a ring on your finger and drag you straight to the chapel," Mulder points out. Scully, however, looks skeptical.

"In all honesty, Mulder, I'm not sure that Daniel would still be interested in marrying me, if he found out where I've been for the past six or seven months," she confesses. "He would be absolutely scandalized by my spending all of this time in the company of men. I'm sure that he would believe my virtue to be absolutely beyond retrieval." She grins. "And that's not even getting into all of the excellent swear words I've picked up, sitting around the cooking fires." Mulder laughs.

"So you think that you'll be free of him, then?" he asks. "When you do eventually go home?" She nods.

"I think so, yes," she says. "Although, as I'm sure my mother will be quick to point out, there likely won't be a single man in all of West Chester- or in all of Philadelphia, no doubt- that will be interested in marrying a woman who has just finished spending God knows how many years in the constant company of soldiers."

"Then every last man in West Chester and in Philadelphia is a fool, and not a single one of them is worthy of you," says Mulder, before he can stop himself.

If Scully had been blushing before, it's nothing compared to the shade of red that she's turning now. She looks up and meets his gaze, her blue eyes shining, and the slow, sweet smile that plays across her lips transforms her entire face into something truly lovely... and for the first time, Mulder becomes fully aware of one very important fact.

Dana Scully is beautiful.

Reluctantly, Mulder forces himself to let go of her hand, and he stands, putting some space between them before he does something that will either get him slapped or make their situation complicated beyond all comprehension. Scully, he would like to believe, looks slightly disappointed, but she hides it quickly.

"Thank you, Mulder," she says. "Your opinion means a great deal to me." He chuckles.

"It shouldn't," he says ruefully. "Not when I'm allowing my family to believe that I'll marry someone who's treated my best friend so shamefully." Scully frowns.

"Why wouldn't your family believe that, if you and Diana are engaged?" she asks, confused.

"Because we're not, not officially," Mulder says, even as he's mentally kicking himself for telling her this. He and Scully, he's beginning to realize, are going to need a great deal of self-control to make it through the war without doing something that truly would be cause for scandal, and allowing her to think that he's engaged would probably have been the wiser choice. He knows her well enough to be fairly certain that she would never allow anything improper to happen between herself and another woman's prospective husband. But he's already gone this far, so he might as well explain.

"It's more or less assumed that one day, Diana and I will marry," he says. "We've always been close friends, from the time that she came to live with Charles Spender... and I guess that to my parents- to most people, probably- if an unmarried boy and an unmarried girl are that close, it's because they plan to wed, eventually, when they're old enough. My parents and Charles Spender love the idea; it would mean the consolidation of both of their families' fortunes. And Diana...." He shrugs. "Well, I'm pretty sure that she was hoping I would have proposed by the time I left Fredericksburg today."

"But you didn't?" Scully asks, and he shakes his head.

"To be perfectly frank...." Don't, he tells himself, she doesn't need to know, but his rational mind seems to have taken a leave of absence, and he ploughs ahead recklessly. "In all honesty, Scully, I'm beginning to have second thoughts."

"You are?" asks Scully, in a tone somewhat more cheerful than what could be called appropriate for this sort of admission. She seems to realize this immediately, and adopts a more sober countenance. "Not just because of how she treated me, I hope. You were right that it was unfair of me to expect her to be completely welcoming without having any notice that I would be coming along with you."

"No, not because of that, necessarily," Mulder replies, "though it's related to that, a little bit." He bites his lip, thinking. "Scully, you know that sometimes, I tend to be... impulsive, wouldn't you say?" Scully laughs.

"Sometimes, Mulder?" She chuckles, shaking her head. "I'd say that's a bit of an understatement, wouldn't you?" He grins sheepishly.

"All right, most of the time," he concedes. "I don't mind when the plan gets shot to hell at the last second, and I honestly enjoy improvising, doing things spur of the moment. And I just got to thinking, this week... what would it be like, for someone who dislikes surprises and always prefers to know, ahead of time, exactly how everything is going to be, to end up married to someone as impulsive as I am?" Scully seems to be thinking this over.

"It doesn't seem like the perfect recipe for domestic bliss," she says. "But do you really think that Diana hasn't had these same doubts? If she's known you for this long, your penchant for doing things spur of the moment can't have escaped her notice."

"No, it hasn't," says Mulder. "But I think that Diana might be operating under the age-old assumption that marriage is going to change me, make me more level-headed and less attracted to excitement." Scully looks at him skeptically.

"So you're saying that she's in love with the man she wants you to become, as opposed to the man that you actually are?"

"Well, to be honest, she's never told me that she loves me," Mulder admits. "So maybe she's not worried about love, one way or the other."

"I can't imagine marrying someone that I didn't love," says Scully. "I mean... I know that it's relatively common, I know that plenty of marriages are arranged, or are a matter of convenience, but... I just can't fathom placing all of my chances for my future happiness on the hope that being married will change traits that are essential to who my husband truly is." With a sigh, she stands. "Listen," she says, picking up her things again. "I'm supposed to be down by the riverbank in about a half hour, all right?" Mulder frowns.

"What for?" he asks.

"I'm in the rotation for guard duty," Scully explains. "The colonel of the Forty-Fourth New York made the rounds at the beginning of the week, I'm told, and said that all sharpshooters are required to take a turn on the picket lines."

"How long?" Mulder asks.

"I should be relieved and back back by supper, I think," Scully answers, and Mulder nods.

"Be careful, all right?" he advises her. "Stay awake. No distractions." Scully rolls her eyes.

"Of course, because I'm the one who needs to be told things like that," she says. "Do you think that you can manage to keep yourself out of trouble for the rest of the afternoon while I'm gone?" Mulder scowls at her, but underneath, he's fighting off a smile. His fear that he and Scully might have lost this over Diana, this easy rapport between them, has been consuming him since the night she had ridden off in anger, and discovering that they're going to be all right is a relief beyond comparison.

"Listen, I was doing just fine all on my own before you showed up in this regiment to torment me," he tells her, and she grins.

"You just keep on telling yourself that, Mulder. I'll see you at supper tonight, all right?" And with a final wave, she ducks back out of the tent and is gone. Mulder returns to his new cot and flops back down onto the stretched, waxed canvas with a groan.

Just what is he getting himself into?

#X-Files Fanfic #my fic #By the Dim and Flaring Lamps

114 notes · View notes

quicksiluers · 2 years ago

Photo

Horatio Gouverneur Wright (March 6, 1820 – July 2, 1899) was born in Clinton, Connecticut, son of Edward and Nancy Wright. His military career began after graduating 2nd from a class of 52 from the United States Military Academy in 1841. He was commissioned into the Corps of Engineers, and taught briefly at West Point before being sent to Florida to work on infrastructure and fortification improvements.

At the outbreak of the Civil War, Wright first took part in the evacuation and destruction of the Norfolk Navy Yard on April 20, 1861, before it could fall into Confederate hands. Although he was captured during the operation, he was released four days later. He began work on fortifications around Washington DC, before being assigned as chief engineer to the division of Samuel P. Heintzelman. He served with the division during the Battle of First Manassas, which led to his promotion to Brigadier General on September 16, 1861. He was then made the chief engineer for Major General Thomas W. Sherman during the Front Royal campaign. In February of 1862, he led troops against Confederate forces along the Florida coast, and in June led a division under Henry W. Benham during the battle of Secessionville. He was moved to the Department of the Ohio, and took part in forcing Confederate general Braxton Bragg out of Kentucky. He was promoted to Major General on July 18, 1862, but the appointment was first refused by Congress.

In May of 1863, Wright was given a command of a division in the VI Corps under General John Sedgwick. He led the division through the battles of Gettysburg and Rappahannock Bridge, as well as during the Mine Run Campaign. In May of 1864, he led his division through the Battle of the Wilderness, and following the death of Sedgwick at the Battle of Spotsylvania Courthouse, was given command of the entire corps until the end of the campaign. He was again promoted to Major General, and was confirmed on May 12, 1864. He led his corps through the Battle of Cold Harbor, and during the Valley Campaign of 1864. Wright and his corps were sent to Washington, DC to help prevent Confederate General Jubal Early from attacking the capital. Wright participated in the Battle of Fort Stevens, and directed the Union army at the Battle of Cedar Creek before Union General Philip Sheridan arrived and took over. At the Battle of Petersburg, Wright and the VI Corps were some of the first Union soldiers to breakthrough Confederate lines, and the corps went on to defeat Confederate forces during the Battle of Sayler’s Creek on April 6, 1865.

After the war, Wright continued his service with the United States military, and took part in engineering projects such as the completion of the Washington Monument and the construction of the Brooklyn Bridge.

#horatio wright #american civil war #us civil war #civil war #army of the potomac #fun fact wright helped with finishing off the washington monument so that's fun #and...i just realized this but he's 2 years older than grant??#why did i think he was younger...oh well you learn something new every day

3 notes · View notes

orbemnews · 4 years ago

Link

Middlesex man believes Dominion Energy to blame for flooding on his property MIDDLESEX COUNTY, Va. — A Middlesex County man reached out to the CBS 6 Problem Solvers regarding extensive flooding on his property that he believed was caused by recent Dominion Energy activity. On the land his grandfather purchased in 1946, just off the Rappahannock River, Wayne Toney said he’s experiencing a problem he hasn’t in 33 years. “Water was everywhere,” said Toney. From May through August, Toney said Dominion Energy crews had pallets on his land as part of an easement as they worked to install communications fiber on the lines. But Toney said the trouble came several months later. On four different occasions, beginning in the Fall, Toney said there had been flooding on his land in the area where Dominion Energy crews had been doing their work. Most of it, was in an area just adjacent to the work — in Theodore Kenyear’s yard. “My wife has already renamed it the Tappahannock,” said Kenyear, with a laugh. “I’ve been here for over 20 years, and I’ve never had my backyard to flood at all.” Toney said he had reached out to Dominion Energy, and they had denied liability, but offered an appeasement of about $1900. An amount Toney said, based on other estimates he had gotten on his own, wouldn’t be enough to fix the damage. “This is Let ‘Er Fly Landworks as you can see,” said Toney, as he read the estimate. “That’s $5,300.” Toney said a second estimate by William Willis Contractor amounted to $12,000. In a letter, Dominion Energy gave Toney an April 30 deadline to accept or decline the $1900 settlement. An offer Toney said he planned to decline. “I want them to give me the proper amount to fix the problem,” said Toney. A spokesperson from Dominion Energy told CBS 6 that after investigating the claim, they had determined that the area where the water ponding occurred was outside the easement and not impacted by the project. That spokesperson also sent photos, outlining in yellow the project limits inside the right of way, and the adjacent blue circle, indicating the low-lying area. Dominion Energy Dominion Energy also issued the following statement: Dominion Energy continues to work in good faith to resolve this matter with the landowner. We investigated the landowner’s claims and we do not believe the property damage was caused by our recent activities; however, in the spirit of compromise and customer resolution, we have offered to help with a part of the estimated cost of repair. window.fbAsyncInit = function() FB.init( appId : '774910576305405', xfbml : true, version : 'v2.9' ); ; (function(d, s, id) var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "http://connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js"; js.async = true; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs); (document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk')); Source link Orbem News #believes #blame #ChesterfieldCounty #Dominion #Energy #flooding #HenricoCounty #Man #Middlesex #property #Richmond #Virginia

0 notes

syrupwit · 4 years ago

Text

“Into the Dusk-Charged Air” by John Ashbery

Far from the Rappahannock, the silent Danube moves along toward the sea. The brown and green Nile rolls slowly Like the Niagara's welling descent. Tractors stood on the green banks of the Loire Near where it joined the Cher. The St. Lawrence prods among black stones And mud. But the Arno is all stones. Wind ruffles the Hudson's Surface. The Irawaddy is overflowing. But the yellowish, gray Tiber Is contained within steep banks. The Isar Flows too fast to swim in, the Jordan's water Courses over the flat land. The Allegheny and its boats Were dark blue. The Moskowa is Gray boats. The Amstel flows slowly. Leaves fall into the Connecticut as it passes Underneath. The Liffey is full of sewage, Like the Seine, but unlike The brownish-yellow Dordogne. Mountains hem in the Colorado And the Oder is very deep, almost As deep as the Congo is wide. The plain banks of the Neva are Gray. The dark Saône flows silently. And the Volga is long and wide As it flows across the brownish land. The Ebro Is blue, and slow. The Shannon flows Swiftly between its banks. The Mississippi Is one of the world's longest rivers, like the Amazon. It has the Missouri for a tributary. The Harlem flows amid factories And buildings. The Nelson is in Canada, Flowing. Through hard banks the Dubawnt Forces its way. People walk near the Trent. The landscape around the Mohawk stretches away; The Rubicon is merely a brook. In winter the Main Surges; the Rhine sings its eternal song. The Rhône slogs along through whitish banks And the Rio Grande spins tales of the past. The Loir bursts its frozen shackles But the Moldau's wet mud ensnares it. The East catches the light. Near the Escaut the noise of factories echoes And the sinuous Humboldt gurgles wildly. The Po too flows, and the many-colored Thames. Into the Atlantic Ocean Pours the Garonne. Few ships navigate On the Housatonic, but quite a few can be seen On the Elbe. For centuries The Afton has flowed. If the Rio Negro Could abandon its song, and the Magdalena The jungle flowers, the Tagus Would still flow serenely, and the Ohio Abrade its slate banks. The tan Euphrates would Sidle silently across the world. The Yukon Was choked with ice, but the Susquehanna still pushed Bravely along. The Dee caught the day's last flares Like the Pilcomayo's carrion rose. The Peace offered eternal fragrance Perhaps, but the Mackenzie churned livid mud Like tan chalk-marks. Near where The Brahmaputra slapped swollen dikes And the Pechora? The São Francisco Skulks amid gray, rubbery nettles. The Liard's Reflexes are slow, and the Arkansas erodes Anthracite hummocks. The Paraná stinks. The Ottawa is light emerald green Among grays. Better that the Indus fade In steaming sands! Let the Brazos Freeze solid! And the Wabash turn to a leaden Cinder of ice! The Marañón is too tepid, we must Find a way to freeze it hard. The Ural Is freezing slowly in the blasts. The black Yonne Congeals nicely. And the Petit-Morin Curls up on the solid earth. The Inn Does not remember better times, and the Merrimack's Galvanized. The Ganges is liquid snow by now; The Vyatka's ice-gray. The once-molten Tennessee's Curdled. The Japurá is a pack of ice. Gelid The Columbia's gray loam banks. The Don's merely A giant icicle. The Niger freezes, slowly. The interminable Lena plods on But the Purus' mercurial waters are icy, grim With cold. The Loing is choked with fragments of ice. The Weser is frozen, like liquid air. And so is the Kama. And the beige, thickly flowing Tocantins. The rivers bask in the cold. The stern Uruguay chafes its banks, A mass of ice. The Hooghly is solid Ice. The Adour is silent, motionless. The lovely Tigris is nothing but scratchy ice Like the Yellowstone, with its osier-clustered banks. The Mekong is beginning to thaw out a little And the Donets gurgles beneath the Huge blocks of ice. The Manzanares gushes free. The Illinois darts through the sunny air again. But the Dnieper is still ice-bound. Somewhere The Salado propels its floes, but the Roosevelt's Frozen. The Oka is frozen solider Than the Somme. The Minho slumbers In winter, nor does the Snake Remember August. Hilarious, the Canadian Is solid ice. The Madeira slavers Across the thawing fields, and the Plata laughs. The Dvina soaks up the snow. The Sava's Temperature is above freezing. The Avon Carols noiselessly. The Drôme presses Grass banks; the Adige's frozen Surface is like gray pebbles.

Birds circle the Ticino. In winter The Var was dark blue, unfrozen. The Thwaite, cold, is choked with sandy ice; The Ardèche glistens feebly through the freezing rain.

#poetry #john ashbery /#But the Arno is all stones.

1 note · View note