Field guide No. 474
Snake-tipped fiddleheads in spring
Uncoiling, carefully.
On a forest floor, young fern fronds unroll from tight coils, and each tip ends in the head of a green snake. Spring is going about it carefully.
Field noteFiddleheads coil like snakes, and here the likeness went too far. Fern at the bottom, viper at the tip.
Also possible, also breaking category
A message with some weightRadio dishes gather whispers from far off. This one is gathering a sand pile, and the message is mostly ballast.
Downhill unspoolingThread is white and laid in lanes; so are pistes. The groomers have merely taken the hint.
The antler-cord telephoneCords end in plugs and antlers end in deer. Swapping the ends is wrong but not contradictory.
Pearls between the pagesBooks are paper, not bivalves. Growing pearls is an oyster’s line of work.