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The Morning Porch

Daily short takes from an Appalachian hollow

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humidity

June 21, 2021 by Dave Bonta

Hot and humid. A silver-spotted skipper draws my eye to a bindweed trumpet, its silent hosannas seemingly aimed at the ancient rose bush.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags bindweed, humidity, rose bush, silver-spotted skipper
June 20, 2021 by Dave Bonta

Humidity so thick that breathing feels like vaping. Cabbage whites puddle in the road—the hallucinatory, slow fanning of 21 pairs of wings.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags cabbage white butterfly, humidity
August 13, 2016 by Dave Bonta

Warm and humid. The air is redolent with rot and mold. A hummingbird zooms past, almost too fast for the eye to register. My stomach growls.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags humidity, ruby-throated hummingbird
August 20, 2014 by Dave Bonta

Overcast and humid. A Carolina wren trills in short bursts, as if in imitation of the crickets creaking in the long grass.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags Carolina wren, crickets, humidity 1 Comment
May 22, 2013 by Dave Bonta

Warm and humid. A hornet inspecting the porch on foot pauses in front of my sandals, waving her antennae like Geiger counter wands.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags hornet, humidity 1 Comment
June 22, 2011 by Dave Bonta

The steady rain of 6 a.m. gives way to sticky heat by 10. I stand gazing like a sad father at the portion of my garden given over to moss.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags humidity, moss, rain 1 Comment

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On This Day

  • September 6, 2025
    A shimmer of rain, which the roof gathers into a smattering of drips. A pileated woodpecker flies over, yelling its head off. A pair of catbirds exchange notes.
  • September 6, 2024
    Another cool, clear, still morning. The bang of a walnut on a metal roof. A chipmunk’s metronome.
  • September 6, 2023
    A nuthatch calling just inside the woods. From the barnyard, a Carolina wren. Chickadee in the yard. Then the sun comes up and it’s a party.
  • September 6, 2022
    A break in the showers: it’s overcast but bright. A slug glides slowly up the porch railing with its 27,000 teeth.
  • September 6, 2021
    In the dark of the moon, the luminance of stars. From town, a wailing of fire sirens, their literally compelling music an eerie, out-of-sync duet.

See all...

Related book

Cover of Ice Mountain with a linocut of a big ridgetop tree.

What I do after I sit on the porch. One winter and spring's daily walks distilled into short poems with linocut illustrations by Beth Adams.

Header image: detail from Paper Garden by Clive Hicks-Jenkins (used by permission)

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