Sunday April 17, 2016

Dave Bonta April 17, 2016

The raspy call of a red-winged blackbird, rare visitor to the mountain. A lone Canada goose goes over, honking steadily. The sun comes up.

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A lull in the snowfall and the yard is alive with juncos, hopping around each clump of dried grass, gleaning their second breakfast. …

Between storms, the sound of traffic. Between the white ground and the white sky, fog, and the haute couture of snow coating every tree. …

A tangle of tracks in the yard: rabbit, cat, squirrel, mouse... I'm not picturing a children's book, but each creature fearful and alone. …

Two ravens hang high against the clouds without flapping a wing. Two more appear and attack, croaking, and all four soar off to the north. …

Loud traffic sound from the west. A downy woodpecker keeps interrupting his tapping to take short, zigzagging flights among the trees. …

Last night, I gave the dog back to her family. In the morning, two inches of wind-blown snow, and the yard unmarred by a single track. …

It's very cold; the tall locust at the woods' edge creaks with ice. A woodpecker taps on the topmost limb, silhouetted against pink clouds. …

Trees rock and sway, infiltrated by snowflakes flying this way and that. From deep in the lilac, the wandering warble of a tree sparrow. …

Fine snow blurs the edges of the porch. The feral cat has walked in her own footsteps through the garden, a clear print in each old crater. …

The overcast sky looks the same, but the light turns from glow to dull in just 15 minutes. I watch a brown creeper but hear only nuthatches. …

A titmouse lands on a snowy branch and puffs out the white down on its breast. From above the spring, a chickadee's two-note song: hey ho. …

Branches plastered with white still provoke that old schoolboy excitement: a snow day! The wet tips of the icicles tremble in the dawn wind. …

The Morning Porch/Patio