They say it is the worst spring in the Pacific Northwest since 1955. Sometimes wet, sometimes not but almost every day relentlessly gray: bone gray, slate gray, dirty sheep’s wool gray, elephant gray, battleship gray, leaden gray, silver gray, and on a good day light that could pass for platinum gray. Today it’s powdered ash gray.
A while back I read that carpe diem or “seize the day” was slightly mistranslated. “Pluck” or “gather” is closer to the original. Curious I went to Horace’s ode to check it out. The poet considers whether the winter past is one of many more or whether it’s the last one Jupiter has decided to give him–this very winter that wears out the sea on the rocks.
That got me to thinking more fondly and (dare I say) gratefully about the past spring and what might yet prove a summer of similar hue. If it were the last one Jupiter should choose to give me, what glorious subtleties of colour and shading, tint and hue the eye might find to pluck like sweet orbs of fruit about to fall. Gather the day.