Dear messenger of Spring that tarried too long, you're doubly dear because you come so late.
May 26, 2023
In Northern Minnesota, winter can last long, and then all at once the snow is gone and the ice recedes from the lakes. Photographer Dennis E. Anderson showcases the remarkable transition into a late-arriving spring, with lines of poetry by Henry Van Dyke.
Long-lasting winter snow lingers with this willow tree on Lake May, early May 2023. Ah, who will tell me, in these leaden days, why the sweet Spring delays.
A flock of six American merganser take off at Erickson’s landing in the morning as the lake ice recedes in early May. “Wait, wait, wait! Oh, wait a while for Spring!”
From the beach at Lake May, the ice is receding. By May 9, it was gone. The woods were bare: and every night the frost to all my longings spoke a silent nay, and told me Spring was far and far away.
Trumpeter swans, hanging out here on Fifth Lake, were almost extinct when the photographer was a kid growing up in these parts. They’re back. For all delay! What sweetness treasured up.
A pair of hooded merganser ducks spend the morning at Erickson’s Landing. Thronging in haste to kiss the feet of May.
A palm warbler sits on a spring tree at Fifth Lake in early May. Now oriole and blue-bird, thrush and lark, warbler and wren and vireo, confuse their music; for the living spark of Love has touched the fuel of desire, and every heart leaps up in singing fire.
Here’s a male common American merganser on a May morning after the ice is gone. And lead me deep into the Spring divine that makes amends for all the wintry past.
Behold the common loon in late morning on Fifth Lake. Of silent birds that hid in leafless woods, melt into rippling floods of gladness unrepressed.
A belted kingfisher rests at Fifth Lake on an early spring tree not yet in bloom. Filling the air with praise, as if a silver chime of bells had pealed!
