A heavy, gray sky that from time to time emits a shimmer of fine precipitation. Woodpeckers’ rhythms turn irregular as they move from their drumming trees to their dining trees. A bit of highway noise for the first time in a week.
clouds
Cold and still as the last few yellow-bellied clouds sail off. A fast raven chase goes over, trailing metallic shrieks. The sun clears the ridge and all the trees don their blue shadows.
Quiet except for the wingbeats of a raven. When the icy breeze dies, my breath begins to freeze to my glasses. Sun-sparkles in the snow fall victim to a bank of clouds.
The deep cold continues, with a fresh dusting of snow on the porch and high, thin clouds that sap the sun of its blaze. A bitter wind slips in under my coat.
Sunrise sky like an illuminated manuscript: that blue, that gold leaf. The red squirrel pokes its head out of its hole in the black locust behind the spinghouse to give everything a resounding scold.
In deep cold and silence, entranced by sun-sparkle and the slow shadow-play of trees in the yard, I nearly turn into the Simpsons meme, Old Man Yells at Clouds.
Deep cold. Somewhere up on the ridge, an oak’s icy heartwood goes off like a gun. Ten minutes before sunrise, the eastern sky turns blood-red. A Carolina wren offers the briefest of commentaries.
Cold, windy, and mostly clear for the hour between sunrise and the actual appearance of the sun. Wriggling my fingers for warmth, I watch a small cloud acquiring a glow as it sails off east.
A cold, white expanse of sky with one small blaze off through the trees. It’s quiet. A squirrel chiseling a walnut shell is the loudest thing.
Blue sky, orange clouds, and the temperature so far below freezing, the slightest breeze turns my cheeks numb. After a while I notice the complete absence of squirrels.
Another dusting of snow. An hour past sunrise, the clouds above the ridge ease open just enough for the sun to glower through for two minutes.
A dusting of snow that will be gone by the afternoon, under a sky hoarding its white. A downy woodpecker’s machine-gun burst of taps.
A wedge of blue sky opens at sunrise. Four pileated woodpeckers in the hollow take turns drumming, two low, two high. Half an hour later, it’s gray and quiet.
Sunrise. A spirited argument breaks out between a raven and some crows as the sky’s ephemeral pagentry fades to gray.