Sun in the treetops. I try to re-find the half moon—nothing but goldfinches.
American goldfinch
7/7/2024
Clear and blessedly cool as sunlight floods the treetops. A distant siren. The incessant chatter of goldfinches.
7/3/2024
A deer moves through the sunrise meadow, head and ears visible above the weeds. The furious chittering of a small flock of goldfinches swirling past.
7/2/2024
The garlic heads in my yard give pause: a crowd of inverted commas, punctuating wildly. A goldfinch drops by to strip the seeds from an old weed stalk.
6/1/2024
Long johns on the first of June! 41F/5C. And the sun already in the treetops with the goldfinches.
5/8/2024
A damp sunrise after thunderstorms in the night. Waves of scent from the lilac, whose blossoms are beginning to fade and droop. The nonstop chatter of goldfinches.
3/29/2024
A goldfinch foraging alone in the crown of a birch continues to warble, intonation rising and falling as if still in conversation with the flock. The sun muscles up through the ridgetop trees.
3/27/2024
The briefest opening in the clouds for sunrise. The first brown thrasher drops by to sing a few bars. Then the squeaky wheels of goldfinches, converging on my mother’s feeders.
12/26/2023
Rain tapering into mist and drizzle. A squirrel finds a black walnut next to the road, swiftly de-husks it and carries it away. The sky brightens. A goldfinch lisps a single note.
11/24/2023
Overcast but bright. I watch small flocks of birds move through the tops of the birches: juncos, kinglets, goldfinches, each skeletal crown studded with winged jewels.
11/9/2023
it starts raining just as I come out on the porch, completing the November trinity: cold, gray, and wet. Goldfinch chatter. The keening of truck tires on the interstate.
9/13/2023
Cool and quiet, once all the newly arrived night travelers have stopped chirping. Patches of blue sky appear. A goldfinch twitters half-heartedly.
8/10/2023
It’s raining and I’m mesmerized by the radar map, its blue and purple blobs. When the downpour begins to abate, the first thing I hear is the twittering of goldfinches.
7/20/2023
Nuthatch scolding a gray squirrel, who scratches himself with a hind leg. The rising sun takes its place among the goldfinches.