Cool beginning to another scorcher. A fly goes for a walk down a porch column. The thud of a walnut on the road.
flies
8/29/2021
Almost fall. The motherless fawn running out of the woods has lost its spots but not its cloud of flies.
6/26/2021
Feet propped up, my trouser legs become new territory for flies. A vulture glides over the forest, its shadow racing up and down the trees.
4/19/2020
Bright and warm. A squirrel in the lilac drops to the ground for a quick roll, as if scratching an itch. A fat fly moves into the shade.
3/7/2020
Cloudless and cool. I wonder idly about the target shooter a couple of miles away, their preferred pronouns. A fly walks the rim of my mug.
12/30/2019
A pause in the rain. Under a dripping cedar limb, two filmy-winged winter insects dance side by side, pogoing like airborne punks.
6/12/2019
My wife observes that it’s a morning for wrens and not for sparrows. A new pile of dogshit has acquired an entourage of green bottle flies.
4/28/2018
Sun warms the porch; a rising buzz of flies. Each spicebush around the farm is yellowing up on its own schedule, bud to fuzz to frowze.
2/1/2018
A few degrees above freezing; the ground’s thin coat of snow already looks mangy. I spot a tiny fly walking purposefully across the porch.
11/24/2017
Despite the temperature—two degrees above freezing—a half dozen small insects dance above a branch at the woods’ edge, back-lit by the sun.
10/13/2017
Cold and gloomy despite the bright leaves; even the wren sounds querulous. When I look again, the unmoving fly is gone from the wall.
10/6/2017
Down-hollow, the nocturnal katydids are already getting started: time is short. A fly on its back treads the air, trying to right itself.
10/1/2016
Mist turns into drizzle. A small, filmy-winged fly drifts back and forth across the yard, heedless as a texting teen. A goldfinch monologue.
8/23/2016
I wish I had names for all the filmy-winged insects that appear like spirits when the light is strong and the shadows behind them are deep.