Peonies are to death what roses are to love. After this afternoon’s predicted storms I’m sure they’ll all be bowed, poor thornless things.
The view from my front porch first thing in the morning, in 140 or fewer characters.
Monthly Archives: May 2010
A rose-breasted grosbeak flutters...
A rose-breasted grosbeak flutters up from the creek singing clear, cool notes. A cranefly drifts through a sunbeam, carrying its legs.
A pileated woodpecker explores...
A pileated woodpecker explores a fallen tree in the meadow, the scarlet arrow of his crest appearing and disappearing in the dame’s-rocket.
The first four peonies burst their...
The first four peonies burst their buds in the night and open to a sky of hazy pink. From under the house, a cat’s hollow cough.
Tagged cats, peony
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Mid-morning. Already I am too...
Mid-morning. Already I am too warm in my big mammal body, but the oriole’s cheer is relentless. Such a small adjustment from heat to hate!
Tagged Baltimore oriole
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Up before dawn, I watch the morning...
Up before dawn, I watch the morning star climbing through the treetops. The birds awake: fragments of song like an orchestra tuning up.
Tagged Venus
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Wood thrushes dart back and forth...
Wood thrushes dart back and forth; three squirrel species briefly converge. My yard is less comprehensible to me than a street in Bangkok.
Tagged squirrels, wood thrush
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The female towhee chitters until...
The female towhee chitters until the male flies in, mates, and flies off. Again. Once more. Then she craps and goes back to foraging.
Tagged towhee
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Light rain. A female towhee carries...
Light rain. A female towhee carries load after load of dead grass into a rosebush while a yearling male redstart sings and noshes in the treetops.
Tagged redstart, towhee
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A dandelion-seed parachute drifting...
A dandelion-seed parachute drifting past the porch shudders, hit by a raindrop. The streambank grass ripples where a chipmunk runs.
Tagged chipmunks, dandelion
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The clouds finally thin out at...
The clouds finally thin out at mid-morning. An orange skipper passes over the thin-bladed grass to settle on the sunny half of a dock leaf.
Tagged burdock, skippers
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So clear, even the mourning dove...
So clear, even the mourning dove sounds joyful. Muffled thuds of a pileated in a dead tree, knocking—as Rumi would say—from the inside.
Cool and quiet—a thoroughly...
Cool and quiet—a thoroughly dull morning, I’m thinking. Just then a hen turkey lands in the yard with a clamor of wings and saunters off.
Tagged wild turkey
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Hard rain forces the phoebes to...
Hard rain forces the phoebes to dive into the weeds in search of prey, returning drenched to their dry and querulous brood under the eaves.
Tagged phoebe
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A blue-gray gnatcatcher hoovering...
A blue-gray gnatcatcher hoovering insects from the cherry leaves hovers almost like a hummingbird, I think, until the real thing zooms by.
Tagged gnatcatcher, hummingbird
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At daybreak, a small deer leaps...
At daybreak, a small deer leaps and twists like a bronco with an invisible rider, then careens through the purple haze of dame’s-rocket.
Tagged dame's-rocket, deer
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From the luminous green wall of...
From the luminous green wall of the woods, a pewee calls. Maple keys come spinning, take the place of yesterday’s hailstones on the porch.
Tagged hail, pewee, red maple
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Yes, I can watch tanagers in the...
Yes, I can watch tanagers in the treetops, a hooded warbler in the bush. But just over the ridge, the interstate howls. There’s no escape.
Tagged hooded warbler, I-99, scarlet tanager
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From the moment I come out, the...
From the moment I come out, the world conspires to wake me up: yesterday, the tulip tree dropped a branch; today, a Cooper’s hawk swoops in.
Tagged Cooper's hawk, tulip tree
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Two grackles appear at the woods...
Two grackles appear at the woods’ edge, iridescent black against the brightest green of the year. In the garden, the first yellow iris.
Tagged common grackle, iris
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Gray squirrel in a walnut tree...
Gray squirrel in a walnut tree gnawing on a walnut, fox squirrel in a maple feasting on maple keys: one spits out shells, the other, wings.
Tagged fox squirrel, squirrels
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A chipping sparrow foraging below...
A chipping sparrow foraging below the porch at sunrise flits up to a branch with a beakful of fine, gray, nest-lining material: my own hair.
Tagged chipping sparrow, haircut, sunrise
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Breezy and just 3 degrees above...
Breezy and just 3 degrees above freezing. A warbler marbled like a sideways zebra wheezes from the lilac: black-and-white, easiest of i.d.s.
Hard rain at dawn on International...
Hard rain at dawn on International Migratory Bird Day, and all the calls blend into one. Yellow Baltimore field thrush, where are you?
Blue overhead at sunrise; cloudy...
Blue overhead at sunrise; cloudy to the north. Bluejays jeer through the sunlit treetops, the margins of their tails white as semaphors.
Tagged bluejays
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I ponder the walking onion in...
I ponder the walking onion in my herb bed—how did it get here? A hummingbird lands on the tip of a branch and shakes water from its wings.
Tagged hummingbird, walking onion
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So clear, it almost hurts: so...
So clear, it almost hurts: so blue, so green. And the yellow warbler singing what birders always hear as “sweet-sweet-sweet-I’m-so-sweet.”
Tagged yellow warbler
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Great-crested flycatcher in the...
Great-crested flycatcher in the bare branches of a locust, silhouetted against the sky. A jet appears: no trail, just a gleaming splinter.
Mid-morning, through the screen...
Mid-morning, through the screen door, faint bell-like notes. I put the phone down and rush out into the rain. The wood thrush is back.
Tagged wood thrush
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Tiger and spicebush swallowtails...
Tiger and spicebush swallowtails circle the white lilac. Leaves blow backwards. A ruby-throated hummingbird hovers a foot from my nose.
The buzz of a black-throated green...
The buzz of a black-throated green warbler, a catbird’s brassy solo, the noodling of a red-eyed vireo: May comes in with a new soundtrack.