The streamside barberry is orange as a hunter’s cap. A crow silhouetted against the sunrise swipes its bill on the branch as if sharpening a knife.
crow
Tuesday March 16, 2021
Under low, heavy clouds, the air is still. I listen for the patter of raindrops but all I hear is a nuthatch, some crows, a raven’s croak.
Monday December 07, 2020
Cold with no wind; the few, small snowflakes float almost straight down. In the almost sunshine, a lone crow is trying to stir things up.
Monday November 09, 2020
Yet another clear, still morning. The light-drenched forest of almost-winter. Outraged crows answering the raven’s chant with their own.
Tuesday October 27, 2020
The green alien at the center of my view—the sprawling old lilac—has at last begun to yellow. The wingbeats of a crow break the silence.
Friday October 23, 2020
A sharp-shinned hawk chases a crow; the crow flies off. The hawk chases a jay; the jay chases back. What fun! thinks the jay. I’m hungry! thinks the hawk.
Monday April 20, 2020
Sun through thin cloud. A crow chases a raven through the treetops, dive-bombing it again and again. The raven’s furious croaks.
Thursday January 09, 2020
Cold and still. Mares’ tails running north-south slowly soften into wool. Fresh tire tracks on the road. A crow’s distant note of protest.
Monday December 16, 2019
Nasal calls: nuthatch, crow. Snow dry enough not to clump, but wet enough to cling to every twig and give each dried beebalm head a cap.
Monday November 18, 2019
The damp silence inside a cloud, broken only by a pileated woodpecker’s muffled tapping and the distant caw of a crow.
Sunday November 10, 2019
That late-autumn smell of wet moss, leaf mould, and freeze-thawed streambank mud, lightly peppered with an American crow’s shrill cant.
Sunday April 07, 2019
Mid-morning, and it’s already too warm for a sweater. I count six, seven, eight bird calls blending into one—except for the crow’s off note.
Tuesday March 26, 2019
After a cold night, the gift of clarity: a mote of drifting cattail down visible at 100 yards. A raven croaking on high is echoed by a crow.
Sunday February 10, 2019
Cold and still. The clouds thicken so slowly, it’s impossible to say in which minute the sun goes in. A crow gives a single, strangled cry.