Daily short takes from an Appalachian hollow
Dave Bonta 
Overcast and cool, with sound out of the east: instead of the dull roar of interstate traffic, the dull roar of the quarry. I take stock of the dying: spicebush, lilac and currant bushes all blighted by nematodes, mildew or rust. The sun makes a bleary appearance.
Clear and still at sunrise, with a sheen of dew on the meadow. A screech owl trills in the distance, nearly drowned out by goldfinches.
From fresh green to dark green to yellow and brown, the bracken is in a perpetual state of resurrection. Two fawns rush past, tormented by flies.
Clear and cool. A towhee calls in the distance. Yesterday’s last yellow flower atop the tall mullein stalk has gone out; nothing there now but the sun.
Fog rising into blue. Everything drips. A hummingbird sits on a small branch in a small walnut tree, head swiveling all about.
In the cool stillness, the snap of a phoebe’s bill on some unwary insect. The four-foot-tall aspen beside the driveway bends under the bird’s weight as he perches on its spindly tip.
A warm breeze abuzz with hummingbirds and mosquitoes. A red-eyed vireo sings a few notes and falls silent. Inside a hollow locust tree, something is beating.
Cool and humid. The crows are carrying on again, like one of those families who share their business with the entire Walmart. The top-heading garlic stalks in the yard have split their hoods to reveal what look like compound eyes.
Cool and clear. Sunlight floods the crown of the tall tulip tree, which releases one yellow leaf into the still air, rocking from side to side as it falls.
Cool as an autumn morning, with twittering goldfinches in lieu of yellow leaves. Just inside the woods’ edge, two deer chase back and forth, pausing for breath six feet apart.
Cool and clear at sunrise, with a sliver of moon like an open parenthesis for something left unsaid. A hummingbird drawn in by purple bergamot sips from the drab white soapwort instead.
A crescent moon above the ridge at dawn is lost in fog by sunrise. A hummingbird bothers the bergamot, and a wood thrush is singing as lustily as if it were still June.
Overcast and damp. A hummingbird visits the jewelweed growing in the drip line from the roof, which still drips from a shower at dawn. A wood thrush sings.
Dawn. I wake a wren roosting above the door. The cardinal is already singing—and off in the distance, another cardinal responds. They seem in general agreement.