The Morning Porch » cattails

Fragments of sky are still visible...

Dave Bonta — Sun, 29 Apr 2012 16:06:29 +0000

Fragments of sky are still visible behind the haze of new leaves. The cattails are shedding; tufts of down drift by. That Sunday silence.

Dave Bonta — Tue, 25 Oct 2011 15:36:03 +0000

Cool air, bright sun and silence, save for the rustling of cattails and the creaking of one dead oak cradled in the limbs of its neighbor.

Dave Bonta — Sat, 26 Mar 2011 14:09:21 +0000

Clear and bracing, like a shot of vodka. The thirteen cattail heads beside the springhouse sway gently in the dawn light.

Dave Bonta — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 13:08:40 +0000

Juncos hop on the icy snow between the cattails where a rabbit disappeared fifteen minutes earlier, taking the darkness with it.

Dave Bonta — Sun, 19 Dec 2010 13:59:58 +0000

The cattails’ broken blades are white with rime. Two juncos flutter up under the springhouse eaves, investigating the empty phoebe nest.

Dave Bonta — Fri, 22 Oct 2010 12:37:31 +0000

Halfway to the ground, a locust leaf reverses course and heads for the sky. The cattails whisper, a restive crowd, but the sun never comes.

Dave Bonta — Mon, 27 Sep 2010 13:24:55 +0000

The downpour eases, and the cattail leaves stop dancing. A burst of bird calls from within the dogwood thicket: waxwings, towhees.

Dave Bonta — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 11:22:21 +0000

In the springhouse marsh, 13 cattail spikes are turning brown. When I go over for a closer look, a deer pops her head up, swivels her ears.

Dave Bonta — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 13:36:00 +0000

In the light breeze, one clump of cattails waves out of sync; the sound of chewing. A few perfunctory phrases from a red-eyed vireo.

Dave Bonta — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 13:22:08 +0000

Beside the springhouse, the twittering zoom of a hummingbird’s courtship dive: from sunlight into cattail shadows and back. Tanager song.