Dawn. The soft calls and dark moving forms of sparrows seem covert, even illicit, until the Carolina wren’s alarm clock chatters to life.
Carolina wren
An incessant scolding from the springhouse: a Carolina wren perches in the tiny, prison-like window, crossed by a single bar of sunlight.
Mid-morning: the first patch of blue, little larger than a moon. In the old lilac below the other house, a Carolina wren bursts into song.
Cold as it is, the birds seem to avoid the sun. In one shadow, a wren putt-putts. In another, a song sparrow shakes water from his wings.
Cloudy and cool. From the wood’s edge, a new song, wistful yet ebullient, from our most faithful, year-round singer, the Carolina wren.
Windy and cool. One branch of the lilac shivers as a Carolina wren conducts a thorough investigation, ticking loudly after each new find.
A silent ordnance drifting on the wind crumbles on impact against my legs. I suddenly realize I haven’t heard a Carolina wren in weeks.
White above, white below, and the dried weedstalks in the yard a scale model of the woods. A wren circulates with a brief news bulletin.
Yesterday’s slush has set like poorly mixed concrete, and the road’s slick as glass. The Carolina wren sings a song I’ve never heard before.
Fine as powdered sugar, this snow. Juncos wallow in it. A Carolina wren lands on a snowy branch, ruffles its feathers, and does not sing.
The bubbling song of a wren in the half-dark makes it suddenly half-light. From now till blue noon, everything else is a footnote.
A Carolina wren trills from the springhouse attic window, and a winter wren answers from under a pile of brush with ten seconds of song.