Saturday August 16, 2014

Dave Bonta August 16, 2014

A scattering of white in my overgrown garden: soapwort, bindweed, fleabane, snakeroot. The sky brightens. A towhee calls from the lilac.

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The tulip tree's luminous new leaves flutter against the blue sky in such a way that one can almost see why foresters call it a poplar. …

The cardinal attacks his reflection then sings in triumph. The Cooper's hawk skulks out of the woods like a ninja. Today I'm the cardinal. …

Dawn. Thin fog infiltrates the trees' pointillist green. A whip-poor-will calls at the woods' edge with the absolute conviction of the mad. …

‪The first dame's-rocket are coming out: dabs of purple among the banks of winter cress and garlic mustard. Basically, it's rocket season.‬ …

All the tulip trees I've planted over the years are shimmering towers of pale green. A rabbit's ears twitch in a patch of wild mustard. …

Above the almost-blooming lilac, a hummingbird is doing his courtship display, rocketing back and forth like the pendulum of a crazed clock. …

Two catbirds tangle in the air above the stream. A hummingbird dive-bombs a gnatcatcher. The first great-crested flycatcher holds forth. …

A cerulean warbler sings at the woods' edge, the same urgent, rising notes that woke me an hour earlier. But still no wood thrush. …

Under a heavy gray sky, the trees are so green they almost seem to throb. Two does chase through the deep grass, as playful as fawns. …

Blue overhead at sunrise; cloudy to the north. Bluejays jeer through the sunlit treetops, the margins of their tails white as semaphors. …

I breathe deeply each time the white lilac's scent wafts across the yard. Behind it, through the half-leafed-out trees, shards of white sky. …

Behind the lilac, the sounds of a fierce wood thrush altercation. A third thrush lands close by and swipes its bill against the branch. …

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