A sunny morning foreclosed upon by leaden clouds. The phoebe continues to rant from atop a black walnut sapling, marking time with his tail.
March 2020
3/29/2020
The almost Kabbalistic way a few syllables of thunder have birthed a whole lexicon of torrent. Fog takes a heavy eraser to the trees.
3/28/2020
From three directions, the white noise of water. A wet vole scuttles down the walk and disappears under the porch.
3/27/2020
A break between showers—enough for the ground almost to dry out and the clouds almost to break. The red-winged blackbird clears his throat.
3/26/2020
So much song from a single robin perched 80 feet up in a black locust! Down below, juncos comb through the prone stiltgrass for seeds.
3/25/2020
My seed order has arrived, so on a cold, wet morning I’m not seeing the yard but a fenced and edible paradise—that dream of my youth.
3/24/2020
A gray day. My fever broken, I notice that the red maple down along the woods’ edge that had blossomed too soon two weeks ago is bare again.
3/23/2020
Rain mingled with the ticking of sleet. The early daffodils cluster together, heads nodding, like youths defying a social-distancing order.
3/22/2020
The sky unscarred by a single contrail is as blue as I’ve ever seen it. A hawk spirals higher and higher, unthreading gravity’s screw.
3/21/2020
Each day the silence grows a little deeper. My self-isolating mother stops on her way past to pick a bouquet of just-opened daffodils.
3/20/2020
Above the roar of the creek, the first phoebe, phoebe, phoebe. Harlequin ladybirds are emerging from the walls of the house and flying off.
3/19/2020
The rain eases off by midday but the cowbird at the top of a tall black locust tree continues to spill his single, liquid note.
3/18/2020
Through egg-white clouds that bright yolk. The hoarse but exuberant call of a red-winged blackbird echoes off the hillside.
3/17/2020
In the fog and mizzle, swelling yellow-green lilac buds are the brightest thing. A single jet goes over in all the time I sit outside.