Dinosaur!

Dinosaur!

I woke up this morning with a strange compulsion to look through some old pictures. Strange, because that’s not usually the first thing on my mind when I wake up. So, I pulled some hat boxes full of pictures out of my closet, opened them, and started going through. I lit on two pictures that […]

The Not So Nice Mice

The Not So Nice Mice

A Fable By Blanche Day Manos The hundred year-old barn was home to a cow, a rooster, some hens, and a mule who pulled a plow. The days they spent in working; each one did its best, and when the sun sank from the sky, the animals wanted rest. But, when evening fell across the […]

A Squirrel, a ‘Possum and a Yarrow

A Squirrel, a ‘Possum and a Yarrow

A Fantastic Fable Wind tore at Squirrel. Rain blinded her, but she kept going, an inch at a time, down the tree toward the river. The roar of the flood drowned out all other sound. The tip of ‘Possum’s tail appeared above swirling dark water near the bank where the Yarrow grew.  With the river […]

A Little Cedar and a Big Storm

A Little Cedar and a Big Storm

  Fierce winds tugged at Little Cedar. His scrawny boughs bent and swayed but he dug his roots deeper and hung onto the rock buried beneath the mountain soil. “The wind is so cold,” said Little Cedar. He shivered from his topmost limb to the bottom of his twisted trunk. “It must be nearly Christmas […]

Cutting Their Teeth on Books

Cutting Their Teeth on Books

At times, I fear for good, old-fashioned books, especially children’s books. That is, I fear until I go into a library or a book store. They are always busy with book-loving people of all ages. Then, I’m comforted; I know the written word is alive and well. I began reading to my son long before […]

Canebreak ABC’s

Canebreak ABC’s

Canebreak ABC’s Red ants, black ants marching all together, through a canebreak by the river in the lovely summer weather. Many-colored butterflies drift or dream or flit among tall stalks for the very fun of it. A caterpillar wriggles and a cricket creaks a song, surrounded by the river cane, thick and green and long. Dragonflies a-dazzle with […]