Another four inches of light powder. We are rich in snow now. The soundtrack is mostly woodpeckers: downy, pileated, red-bellied.
Wednesday February 10, 2021
Overcast. I contemplate the artificial mountain of snow in my yard, its boneless white. Imagine if it were blubber—how the birds would feast.
Tuesday February 09, 2021
Fine snow. Cleaning the dust off my glasses, everything blurs together: white sky, white ground, the noise of trains and sparrows.
Monday February 08, 2021
Bitter cold (-16°C) and still. The rising sun appears in a tiny gap between the trees as if this is all we’re allotted, this bristly thing.
Sunday February 07, 2021
Fine snow begins to fall. A squirrel is leaping through the treetops as if on some other white powder. Wakening nuthatches compare notes.
Saturday February 06, 2021
Sunrise and the clouds turn pink as the waning crescent moon turns pale. A squirrel way up in the woods begins its trek to the bird feeder.
Friday February 05, 2021
One degree above freezing, and the last icicle has turned dull as the eye of a dead fish. As I watch, it trembles in the breeze and lets go.
Thursday February 04, 2021
A crow mob on the move—their angry cries. Sun stripes the snow. I hold my head still to watch the slowly shifting points of glitter.
Wednesday February 03, 2021
This is winter as I remember it from my childhood: more than a foot of drifting snow at 20°F. The Carolina wren is singing under the house.
Tuesday February 02, 2021
The snowstorm over, it’s quiet, except for the wind. A cardinal shelters in a barberry bush, as red as the berries had been.