Tuesday May 11, 2010

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.

On this date

Clouds going from pink to orange to yellow as the sky turns paler blue, all to the sound of running water and the whistling of doves' wings. …

One degree above freezing, and the last icicle has turned dull as the eye of a dead fish. As I watch, it trembles in the breeze and lets go. …

Sky gray as the skin of a corpse. An internal combustion engine's profane orison. Some small bird hammering at the seed of a sunflower. …

Small clouds rise from the decaying snowpack and drift off through the trees. In the yard, a vole's tunnel system is beginning to emerge. …

The strong sun turns snow cascading from branches into gauze. In the deep blue sky, a distant jet, and the harsh, wild cries of a raven. …

Under low, gray clouds, the sound of traffic from the valley. A titmouse at the woods' edge keeps whistling his one, querulous note. …

Cold again after yesterday's thaw. A mourning dove flutters down into the lilac, gets settled on a branch and closes its eyes. …

Freezing rain on a bed of sleet: like listening to thousands of pins dropping. A nuthatch ascends a tree head-first like a brown creeper. …

With less water, the stream is louder than it was yesterday. Three-inch cataracts splash into teacup-sized plunge pools. …

A thousand blemishes sparkle on the side of the white porch column perpendicular to the sun. A red-bellied woodpecker trills and trills. …

Sky and ground are the same flat white. I hear my mother at her bird feeder yelling Go! Go! Go! Go! as a squirrel bounds over the icy crust. …

Sound is out of the east, and the sun's a dimple in the gray. The feeder birds squabble. Would I guess a storm is coming if I didn't know? …

1°F. A breeze feels as sharp as the studded rim of the sun rising through the trees. The call of a cardinal like an engine trying to start. …

A 30-second downpour, followed by a flash and a rumble. A white-throated sparrow ventures three notes of his allegedly sorrowful song. …

The Morning Porch