A male and female goldfinch glean seeds from a tall bull thistle. She eats in silence while he in his loud yellow suit chatters on and on.
August 2011
8/16/2011
As always when the air is clear and the sun at a low angle, I’m astonished by how many small insects drift back and forth between the trees.
8/15/2011
A pileated woodpecker heading for the tall locusts lets out a whoop with every wingbeat, its crest like the bloody barb of a harpoon.
8/14/2011
The storm just past, a bald-faced hornet flies back and forth over the flattened stiltgrass. The crickets pick up where they left off.
8/13/2011
Darkening sky. A downy woodpecker gleaning breakfast from the dead cherry’s flaking limbs pauses to scratch his face with one fast foot.
8/12/2011
Clear and cold. In their communal tent, the caterpillars lie still as mummies in a tomb—gray forms already in their burial wrappings.
8/11/2011
Crystal-clear at sunrise: I’m aware of every smudge and scratch on my glasses. A wood pewee’s call reduced to a single, interrogatory note.
8/10/2011
Power out, I spend the morning on the porch. A large, black assassin bug lands on the sunny side of a column and stalks up toward the roof.
8/9/2011
Drizzle, and from the woods, the steady dripping that makes it sound as if the real rain is there, on the far side of the yard. Slug trail.
8/8/2011
A honeybee conducts a slow inspection of the porch railing, including my boots. I’m pondering the secret cousinship of wrens and crickets.
8/7/2011
Thin fog. A spiderweb spread like a handkerchief a few inches above the ground has a large collection of raindrops, each of them perfect.
8/6/2011
A dark, damp morning. The neighbors stop by with bags of chicken mushroom, freshly picked from where it glowed in the depths of the hollow.
8/5/2011
Humid, yet still so dry that the lilac leaves hang limply. In my last dream before waking, I couldn’t find the exit from an endless mall.
8/4/2011
From the paper mill, the mournful note of the Protestant call to work. I watch an enormous horse-fly on the porch ceiling, ready to sprint.