Weak sun. The meadow seems haunted by strange winds, seedy goldenrod heads bowing and swaying as flocks of sparrows move through.
October 2013
October 16, 2013
The trees seethe with the small birds of winter. Even the cherry stump beside the porch attracts a nuthatch’s thorough investigation.
October 15, 2013
White shapes appear and disappear in the pre-dawn darkness: nervous deer raising and lowering their tails.
October 14, 2013
The fluting of geese from somewhere above the clouds. A bowhunter dressed in green camouflage walks out of the autumn woods.
October 13, 2013
Mist thickens into drizzle; the phoebe falls silent. Under the deer-ravaged black currant bushes, slick black rocks where the stream begins.
October 12, 2013
Several bright spots in the clouds where the sun might be hiding like a pea in a shell game. Dozens of crows fly overhead, most in silence.
October 11, 2013
The all-night rain has stripped the leaves off the witch hazel, revealing the flowers, some clutching raindrops in their pale skinny petals.
October 10, 2013
A muffled explosion from the east: more dynamiting of the valley’s limestone. The sparrows in the lilac act like nothing happened.
October 9, 2013
The air is hazy but cool. Asian ladybugs fly back and forth, orange elytra aglow. A jay forages in the leaf duff, bluer than the sky.
October 8, 2013
Clear and cold. The leaves at the end of the porch have gathered into a dense crowd, as if for warmth. A raven’s distant croak.
October 7, 2013
The silhouettes of small birds (goldfinches?) darting through the crown of a black birch as wind and driving rain strip it of leaves.
October 6, 2013
Warm and humid. A crow lands on the top branch of a nearly bare black walnut tree. It caws three times and flies off with heavy wingbeats.
October 5, 2013
Walnut leaves are scattered all over the porch. What was the wind up to while I slept? In the woods, a migrant thrush expresses mild alarm.
October 4, 2013
A squirrel hurls itself from maple to locust, falling, grabbing hold. It runs to the end of a limb and stops, staring across at the walnut.