Overcast except for a hole where the sun glows like a bleary eye in a socket. A titmouse taps on a windowsill to open a sunflower seed.
clouds
November 10, 2014
Bands of cirrus that might’ve been contrails two hours ago are crossed by a helicopter, ponderous and loud, like an enormous scarab.
September 14, 2014
A cold morning. Two chipmunks calling 100 yards apart fall in and out of sync. Thin clouds block the sun before it ever reaches the porch.
May 8, 2014
From just above the ridge, the tremolo call of a loon. I rush to the edge of the porch and scan the lake-blue fissures between the clouds.
April 5, 2014
Trees sway and gyrate under a blue-gray sky. In a lull between gusts, a lost leaf flutters down out of the clouds. The phoebe calls.
March 25, 2014
A solid gray sky marred only by the sun’s blurred searchlight. It’s cold. From all directions, the anxious-sounding calls of woodpeckers.
March 20, 2014
Dark clouds, and a sombre brightness underneath. A few, wet flakes of snow swirl past. Robin song.
March 15, 2014
Holes open and close in the fast-moving clouds. Where the snow has gone from the yard, a white eggshell rests on the flattened stiltgrass.
February 24, 2014
Cold and bright. The trees stand in their melted pits, legacy of the recent thaw. I watch the wind shred a fast-moving cloud.
February 23, 2014
In the silence after the bulldozer stops, a song sparrow sings his lying spring song over and over. A gauze of stratus cloud dims the sun.
February 11, 2014
It’s cold. A few, desultory flakes drift down from a half-clear sky. The trees’ long shadows fade in and out.
February 8, 2014
Sunlight softened by high clouds. A great stillness, punctuated by the flutter of sparrow wings and a chickadee singing its spring song.
January 28, 2014
It’s very cold. I’m glad for the sun, which however soon begins to pulse as thin, parallel clouds move in, as regular as waves on a beach.
January 15, 2014
A lighter band of clouds above the horizon. Half-way up the brown hillside, a flock of winter birds—flashes of white from their wings.