Saturday April 18, 2015

Dave Bonta April 18, 2015

Flies and butterflies, gnats and gnatcatchers, blue-headed vireo, paper wasp. The towhee in the lilac bush starts his song with a stutter.

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Flakes in the air. The weather's turned cold in time to save the last, shrunken curls of snowbanks, marooned like sea creatures on a beach. …

Late morning: the sun finally comes out. The cedar tree beside the house chirps and shakes with juncos, which soon spill out into the weeds. …

A distant gunshot. A crow. The rumble of a freight train. On a gray day without shadows, any dark thing reminds us of the sun. …

Pine siskins in the bend of the road, eating small stones for their gizzards. They rise as one and settle in the crown of a birch. …

Small birds appear as they fly past, and the sun, too, emerges only to vanish a second later, the fog turning from yellow back to white. …

Trees glistening with raindrops cast shadows through the rising fog. A sudden ripple of squirrel alarm-calls as a hawk cuts through. …

The sound of an altercation among the goldfinches—like a dozen jazz soloists playing at once. The only cloud in the sky finds the sun. …

Snowflakes sail past like far-flung voyagers. On the otherwise lifeless tansy stalks, a green sprig harbors a single, yolk-colored bloom. …

A squirrel foraging in the leaves suddenly streaks for the nearest tree, barely escaping the sharp-shinned hawk hurtling through the forest. …

Patter of rain from a leaden sky. Mouth-shaped wounds on the cherry tree where the porcupine chewed it—by far the brightest spots of color. …

The wind no longer howls, but now the merest breeze provokes a chorus of moans and shrieks. The oaks are finally almost all naked. …

The Morning Porch/Patio