The Morning Porch

January 22, 2020 by Dave Bonta

Classic January morning: clear sky, very still, very cold. A lone crow’s harangue. The furnace stopping in mid-rumble as the power goes out.

October 6, 2025
Crystal-clear. A Cooper’s hawk calls from the top of the tallest tree in the yard as sunrise reddens the western ridge.
October 6, 2024
Clear and cold, with more sky showing through the ridgetop trees. A raucous assembly of crows gives way to ravens—their resonant croaks.
October 6, 2023
Heavily overcast—what the weather app calls “light rain”—with a crow yelling in the distance and a yellow-bellied sapsucker mewing like a kitten.
October 6, 2022
Another woods-edge maple has gone red. Bouncing bet still blooms beside the porch, four months on.
October 6, 2021
Overcast at dawn. The silence is broken by the periodic splats of black walnuts. A barred owl’s single, round note.