Brooklyn in Bloom

On the night of the big moon (is that why everything is so weird?), I walked along the Promenade and saw the changes. The forsythia is opening. I think I'll stop calling it spring barf. I'm happy to see it.

The hellebores are all facing the dipping sun.

The crocuses too cold to open.

And something unexpected shining at the end of dark Doughty Street (where once a beautiful yellow tree blazed): I had thought the witch hazel had been and gone, but this was new. Not the red of two weeks ago, but a golden orange...

Seen to perfection with the sun blazing through it, as it headed down towards evening.

It was a cold evening, just after six and not many people out. A young father and his little girl, rolling down the winter grass hill. I pulled my jersey sleeves over my hands and stuck them into my pockets.

And then the winter hazels. There are at least a dozen in the park, as well as the early blooming Cornelian cherries.

I love these early-blooming shrubs. 

Maybe forsythia is spring barf, after all. The winter hazels are graceful, with delicately yellow tassles and an elegance that belongs to a beautifully dressed and poised woman, one who remains rather enigmatic. Forsythia requires little interpretation. But perhaps she's fun to talk to.

There are just two species of corylopsis here, I think. The orange-anthered shrub is probably Corylopis sinensis, and the other may be C. pauciflora, but I stand open to correction.

What a funny expression.

Red brick in the golden hour, and I called Vince to remind him to watch for the twenty year moon, at home.

In the colder air off choppy water I walked fast along the bike track, below the three layer cake and past a man and his tripod waiting for the sun to make the houses blaze.

There is an urgency now. I feel I must be alert and be everywhere, because things are changing fast, and I have to see them. The winter hazel were not on my radar. Every year it is something new. There are places to go, flowers to photograph...