cardinal

Sunday March 25, 2018

Dave Bonta March 25, 2018

Cold as a well under a deep blue sky torn by the distant roar of military jets. The morning singers carry on: cardinal, song sparrow, robin.

Monday March 12, 2018

Dave Bonta March 12, 2018

Cold and gloomy, but the yard seethes with birds: juncos, cardinals, wren. A hundred yards away, a hawk sits on a limb, bedeviled by crows.

Monday March 05, 2018

Dave Bonta March 5, 2018

Another wintry morning, and I’m marveling at the sharpness of the air in my lungs, the sun in my face, the blue sky, the cardinal’s song.

Friday January 26, 2018

Dave Bonta January 26, 2018

As the sunlight advances, the frosted yard turns from glitter to glisten. The barn-red cardinal’s inexplicably cheerful two-note tune.

Saturday December 30, 2017

Dave Bonta December 30, 2017

Snowstorm. A cardinal sits atop a small tree, his red plumage almost glowing among the white branches. Two woodpeckers tap in and of sync.

Friday March 24, 2017

Dave Bonta March 24, 2017 1

Warm sun and an inversion layer bringing traffic noise from over the ridge. Cardinals and titmice compete with the whine of truck tires.

Friday March 17, 2017

Dave Bonta March 17, 2017

I take off my hat to sunbathe as icicles drop, turning the roof toothless. The brass section tunes up: jay, cardinal, song sparrow.

September 19, 2017
A monarch butterfly en route to Mexico glides over the house, past the orange leaves on the last living branch of a hollow maple.
September 19, 2016
A new bloom of gnats—I saw them swarming by the back door—and the yard is full of fall warblers, foraging with the chickadees and titmice.
September 19, 2015
Even unseen, the raven crying rawk rawk from high overhead makes the flat white sky more interesting. In the yard, a monarch's regal orange.
September 19, 2014
A faint smell of sewage on the wind. A wren singing from atop the springhouse in the absence of a female supplies his own call-and-response.
September 19, 2013
Goldfinch, nuthatch, catbird, wren. The herb-garden chipmunk, cheeks bulging, pauses on top of the wall to groom its paws.
September 19, 2012
A dozen vultures fresh from their communal roost circle low overhead, wings shining white whenever they tilt toward the sun—angels of death.
September 19, 2011
A meadow vole takes an after-death journey into the forest in the jaws of a cat, who holds her head high for once and does not slink.
September 19, 2010
A succession of anxious or querulous calls—nuthatch, crow, Cooper's hawk, pileated woodpecker—until sunrise reddens the western ridge.
September 19, 2009
Clear and cold. I follow my breath as it drifts over the ridges and valleys of the tin roof sheltering the oil tanks. A patter of acorns.
September 19, 2008
Gold is spreading from the goldenrod up into the trees, here and there: walnut, elm, birch. A jay dives into the lilac: blue from the sky.