Cold and still at sunrise. With more than a foot of new-fallen snow, the woods’ edge is an asemic text already being edited by squirrels.
2020
12/16/2020
The slow, steady accumulation of dry snow. A raven flies low over the trees with something in its beak. A squirrel’s short-lived footprints.
12/15/2020
Cold and quiet at sunrise. I walk to the ridgetop, clutching my thermos mug. Snow lingers in dips and hollows where the sun can’t reach.
12/14/2020
It’s snowing: fine flakes wet enough to cling to the smallest twigs and give each bergamot stalk a tall white hat. Juncos twitter hosannas.
12/13/2020
After a red sunrise, the sky turns dark for St. Lucy’s Day. But who needs candles? My outrage at our broken politics is incandescent.
12/12/2020
Three degrees above freezing, but it feels balmy. A downy woodpecker descends a maple trunk, chirping loudly with each downward hop.
12/11/2020
Weak sunlight — enough to melt the hard frost, make the ground glisten, conjure up a bit of mist and a Carolina wren’s hearty burble.
12/10/2020
Heavy cloud cover. A flash of red from a male cardinal cutting through the yard. Gray heads of goldenrod almost shine in the gloom.
12/9/2020
Light clouds in the east, dark clouds in the west, and everywhere the hush of the wind. A hawk goes by too fast for the squirrels to notice.
12/8/2020
Bright sun, icy breeze. A few flakes zoom past. The only cloud is tiny and dissolves as I watch, leaving the sky to the fourth-quarter moon.
12/7/2020
Cold with no wind; the few, small snowflakes float almost straight down. In the almost sunshine, a lone crow is trying to stir things up.
12/6/2020
Cloud cover riddled with blue holes, though the sun remains hidden. From beside the springhouse, a higher-pitched, thinner chickadee call.
12/5/2020
Patchy gray sky. A red-breasted nuthatch alights on a tulip tree limb stripped bare by a porcupine, a few bast fibers flapping in the wind.
12/4/2020
The snow has shrunk to a few spots the low sun doesn’t reach. In the herb bed, the only white is a pile of clippings from my last haircut.