I hear something chewing in the tall weeds. Behind the lilac, a hummingbird bent on courtship opens the throttle on its small engine.
June 2011
June 13, 2011
It’s cold—in the mid-50s. One catbird sits at the end of a dead limb overlooking the yard while her mate chases a rival, all in silence.
June 12, 2011
Wood thrush, cerulean warbler, red-eyed vireo, Baltimore oriole—song by song I tick them off as yellow petals fall from the tulip tree.
June 11, 2011
Dead bracken leaf: a sun-bleached carcass. A feral cat pads down the road undetected by squirrels, its sodden gray coat the color of gravel.
June 10, 2011
Back and forth over the yard still in shadow, a cicada killer steers the bright craft of her body, illuminated by the sun.
June 9, 2011
Sticky and warm. A clink of ice in my coffee startles up a deer, her tan coat passing in front of a cloud of blossoming mountain laurel.
June 8, 2011
Evening primroses in the mid-morning heat: so yellow! As the sun climbs, the stigmas slowly retract their claw-shaped shadows.
June 7, 2011
The dawn sky turns salmon. Down by the stream, the hollow cough of a deer. A swig of coffee and I’m off to count birds before the rain.
June 6, 2011
A tiger swallowtail butterfly glows in the strong sun like stained glass. In the shade, a freshly bathed phoebe straightens its feathers.
June 5, 2011
Overcast and cool. A cerulean warbler sounds excited as always—that rising buzz. The bright orange of a robber fly crossing the yard.
June 4, 2011
The robin hops down the road at his usual speed despite the cold. Five minutes later he flies out of the woods with a bright green morsel.
June 3, 2011
Against the sky criss-crossed by contrails, the sudden whiskers of a squirrel peering over the roof’s edge, fixing me in a bug-eyed stare.
June 2, 2011
Dawn finds the walking onions still as trolls, except for a slight swaying—no doubt the wind. A mosquito bite swells between my knuckles.
June 1, 2011
The tulip tree’s in bloom. I peer through binoculars at the enormous yellow cups dripping with nectar, lotuses of the upper air.