The neighbor’s leaf blower, that insect whine. I worry about the oaks that still have leaves—snow is coming, the kind that breaks limbs.
fall foliage
November 12, 2016
Hoarfrost costumes the yard, sparkling in the sun for a few minutes of glory. Oaks that looked brown under clouds glow orange and red again.
November 10, 2016
The stream’s dark thread. A jay pierces it with his bill three times. The scarlet oak I planted so long ago is flying all its red flags.
November 9, 2016
Rain past, the sky brightens. Great crowds of oak leaves are taking the plunge. A freight train whistles an almost perfect minor chord.
November 4, 2016
The red and scarlet oaks have finally turned their namesake colors, and the whole ridge shines like a fresh gut pile in the sun.
November 1, 2016
A squirrel on an oak limb freezes in alarm at the figure passing underneath, that blaze-orange cap a color no longer found in the trees.
October 31, 2016
Cold and mostly clear. A pileated woodpecker riot of one vents its fury in a glowing, golden canopy of chestnut oaks.
October 19, 2016
The barberry beside the stream is turning from the inside out: under a green cloak, salmon pink, blood-red beads, the hurdy-gurdy of a wren.
October 15, 2016
Recovering from a fever, I sit in strong sunlight with nature’s grand spectacle of slow death and decay spread out before me.
October 13, 2016
Rainy and dark, with a steady, fluttering fall of leaves. A freight train rumbling up the valley is the only thing audible over the rain.
October 12, 2016
Clear and still. The witch hazel in the garden has just opened its first blooms, spidery petals a far purer yellow than the curling leaves.
October 9, 2016
Gusty winds. The sun appears several times a minute to light up the forest, which today is noticeably more open, yellower, more ablaze.
October 5, 2016
Another overcast morning. I can see yellow leaves falling way off in the woods like unschooled fish spiralling into the depths.
September 30, 2016
A steady shimmer of rain. At the woods’ edge, the first fall fashions have arrived, two maples trading their faded green for salmon.