2009 – Page 14 – The Morning Porch

June 27, 2009

Dave Bonta June 27, 2009

The red climbing rose is just coming into bloom, but it’s the garlic tops I’m admiring, those coiled green snakes with the heads of birds.

Dave Bonta June 26, 2009

Bright sunshine after a night of thunderstorms. Four deer—two does and two fawns—run through the steaming woods.

Dave Bonta June 25, 2009

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

Dave Bonta June 24, 2009

Another cloudless, cool morning. Two large craneflies joined back-to-back like Dr. Doolittle’s pushmi-pullyu float sedately past.

Dave Bonta June 23, 2009

The catbird sails in and out of the lilac without interrupting his stream of song. Oak leaves glossy as mirrors; the sky so blue it hurts.

Dave Bonta June 22, 2009

Soft applause from the road bank: a doe’s ears flapping as she shakes her head to chase away the flies.

Dave Bonta June 21, 2009

Up early enough to catch the end of the shortest night of the year, alive with wind and gurgling water, fireflies, a lone spring peeper.

Dave Bonta June 20, 2009

A hummingbird grooms itself in the middle of a downpour while a phoebe plucks insects from the side of the dead elm, hovering in place.

Dave Bonta June 19, 2009 1

Another dark morning. The wood pewee makes a rare visit to the edge of the yard, sings one, sad note, and snaps a brown moth out of the air.

Dave Bonta June 18, 2009

The black-robed cowbird at the top of the dead elm burbles authoritatively, like the Grand Ayatollah of the yard taking credit for the rain.

Dave Bonta June 17, 2009

Breezy, overcast, a spit of rain—these reports never seem complete without the weather. The buzz of a hummingbird. A common yellowthroat.

Dave Bonta June 16, 2009

A robin refurbishing an old nest lands each time on the lowest branch and labors up the ladder of limbs with his beakful of dead grass.

Dave Bonta June 15, 2009

A golden light straight out of the Kabbalah, where two angels attend every grass blade—one singing like a vireo, the other, a quarry truck.

Dave Bonta June 14, 2009

In the half-light, the soft crunch of gravel: a bear-shaped shadow ambles up the road, turns onto my walk, stops in front of my door. Waits.