Sunday September 22, 2013

Dave Bonta September 22, 2013

The hornets stream in and out of their hole in the garden, departing to the south, returning from the east. A towhee calling in the dogwood.

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A winter wren warbles his spring song beside the springhouse, appropriately enough, where daffodils have just begun to open. …

Weak sunlight and the creek's quiet gurgle. I think of the dead deer up in the field, her throat torn open by coyotes, feeding their songs. …

Two degrees below freezing and crystal clear. I worry for the tender young leaves of the peonies, paused mid-unfurl—translucent pink commas. …

A half-inch of snow on the ground at sunrise. I look away, at the blue-gray sky. The bare trees shake and chafe, rattle and groan. …

The last of the snow has vanished, and the air shimmers with fine rain. A foraging rabbit keeps pausing to scratch its ear. …

Half an hour till sunrise. Over the brassy din of the dooryard birds, from off in the fog, the soft, wandering warble of a winter wren. …

Back from migration, a Louisiana waterthrush sings above the trickle of a stream. Chickadees excavate a den hole in the dead cherry stump. …

Red maple limbs laden with keys tremble from a pell-mell squirrel. I hear tapping on the storm door, open it and a bee flies out. …

Despite the steady rain and continued cold, the first daffodils are out around the dog statue, limp yellow frocks sodden against the ground. …

The miniature daffodils around the dog statue have shriveled in the night. Turkeys display at the edge of the field, reversible blooms. …

I watch the trees rocking in the thin sunlight as if from a train window, detached. An oak leaf that held on all winter finally falls. …

Despite appearances to the contrary—the sky still gray, rain still withheld—spring has come for the titmouse and his one, querulous note. …

The Morning Porch/Patio