Tuesday January 14, 2014

Dave Bonta January 14, 2014

At the woods’ edge, a jumble of bone-white sticks: spicebush branches debarked by rabbits. A gray blur where a titmouse grooms in the lilac.

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Blue shadows on the snow and a breeze with teeth. I test the snow by tossing out an apple core. It bounces rather than sinks. …

Cloudless and still. As the thermometer needle inches past freezing, the first bluebird of spring warbles once up by the barn. …

Sunrise, and seven species of birds are calling—but not the phoebe, who flies in and out of the old nest under the springhouse eaves. …

From high overhead, the faint cries of swans. I scan the clear sky in vain. A blue jay drinks from a seep in the yard beside the dogwoods. …

On and on, a squirrel scolds some unseen predator. I scan the slope for fox, mink, feral cat—anything to break the monotony of pale brown. …

It's cold. I lie in bed listening to a bluebird. When I emerge onto the porch an hour later, the first blue holes are opening in the clouds. …

The springhouse phoebe has already found a mate. They take turns fluttering up under the eaves to refurbish the 30-year-old nest. …

Cold and dawn-dark at 8:30. The ridge disappears into cloud, allowing me to imagine real mountains—a fastness far from anything but rain. …

The last patch of snow vanished in the night, leaving only the fuzzy erasers of pussy willow to remind us of the purity of the blank page. …

Cardinal song followed by gargling laughter: a starling sits at the top of a locust, its bill a gleaming needle in the deep blue sky. …

Easter Sunday dawns clear and cold. The yard is stippled with fresh tracks. Quiet except for a mourning dove and a red-bellied woodpecker. …

The Morning Porch/Patio