The Morning Porch

October 2, 2010 by Dave Bonta

The witch hazel in my garden is just coming into bloom, yellow tentacles uncurling, the bunched nuts like maledictions waiting to burst.

June 20, 2025
Breezy and cool—a front at last. A train keens in the distance. The whispery discourse of trees in which cicadas have lapsed for a few long moments into silence.
June 20, 2024
A cool beginning to another hot day. The chipping sparrow’s dry rattle. Phoebe and wood-pewee from either side of the woods’ edge like the citizens of neighboring countries comparing accents.
June 20, 2023
Cloudy and cool. I carry an offering of soup bones out to the ravens. A great-crested flycatcher lets loose.
June 20, 2022
A deer grazes a few feet away; I can hear blades of grass tearing. The sun almost breaks through a thin spot in the clouds.
June 20, 2021
Humidity so thick that breathing feels like vaping. Cabbage whites puddle in the road—the hallucinatory, slow fanning of 21 pairs of wings.