The Morning Porch

May 2, 2009 by Dave Bonta

Male and female cardinal meet beak-to-beak in the middle of the driveway. He sings, she gives him a seed or bit of grit, and they fly off.

May 27, 2025
Overcast and cool. As the wood thrush fades in the distance, the brown thrasher parodies his song. Waxwings whistle in the treetops. The sun almost comes out.
May 27, 2024
Dawn: a blurry moon just above the trees losing its glow. The wood thrush’s ethereal song gives way to a red-eyed vireo sounding like a wind-up bird, going at twice normal speed.
May 27, 2023
Another clear, cold morning with little dew. Goldfinches gad about in the tops of the locusts, seemingly oblivious to other birds’ territorial obsessions.
May 27, 2022
A lull between showers; the avian chorus swells. Each recumbent lily-of-the-valley leaf cradles a collection of raindrops.
May 27, 2021
It’s so clear I can see the tiniest specks of aerial flotsam drifting past the sun. A cuckoo switches to his most plaintive call.