Sun through thin clouds on an unseasonably warm morning. A carpenter bee inspects my aging porch. Next to the old broken dog statue in my yard, the white narcissus is in bloom.
carpenter bees
Cool and humid—enough to muffle almost all valley noise. The sun goes back in. A carpenter bee sizes up the rafters.
Mid-morning and it’s already hot. The black locusts—last to leaf out—have a fresh green fuzz. A carpenter bee inspects the roof.
Sunny and warm. Behind the screen of green leaves, a vulture’s lazy drift. A hummingbird collides with a carpenter bee over the yard.
Cold rain. A big carpenter bee flies in, circles the porch, and disappears under the house.
It’s hot. Everything with a stinger is out and about. Two carpenter bees body-slam like professional wrestlers and fall down to the floor.
The buzzing dog-fights of carpenter bees competing for access to the porch’s old wood. The first tiger swallowtail flutters into the yard.
A large leaf-footed bug stalks up and down a porch column, its shadow at its side. Two carpenter bees clash like airborne sumo wrestlers.
The sun disappears before it clears the treetops. A red admiral butterfly and a carpenter bee rest on the porch railing, inches apart.
Sky bluer than a bruise. A small salticid spider suns itself on my sweater. The first carpenter bee makes a slow inspection of the porch.
Two male woodpeckers rattle at each other from 100 yards apart. A carpenter bee inspects the porch, its drone a perfect generator of unease.
Thanks to insomnia, I have two mornings: one with ground fog lit by the waning moon at dawn, the other hot and abuzz with carpenter bees.