Cool and crystal clear. The buzz of battling hummingbirds below the porch where jewelweed has eluded the deer.
ruby-throated hummingbird
August 2, 2022
Cloudy and cool. A male hummingbird pauses over the faded bergamot patch, then buzzes off.
July 24, 2022
Hazy but not yet hot. Hummingbirds circle the soapwort patch, as if following the red threads of bindweed.
June 24, 2022
Overcast and cool. Two deer run into the woods as another snorts alarm up in the field. Another hummingbird buzzes me, ruby gorget ablaze.
June 22, 2022
Warm and humid. A hummingbird interrupts my writing, hovering in front of my face, then zipping up to where a feeder once hung.
May 28, 2022
Cool and clearing. A hummingbird pauses on her way past the porch, attracted by the floorboards’ peeling red paint.
May 20, 2022
Rain. The hummingbird darts out to drink from her favorite spiderweb. Indigo bunting like the one blue leaf.
May 19, 2022
At the top of a dead stalk in the yard, a cup-shaped spiderweb retains drops of fog. A hummingbird circles, taking little sips.
May 14, 2022
The rain stops and the thrush singing at the woods’ edge is joined by warblers, flycatchers, pewee, thrasher, a hummingbird’s mad courtship flight…
May 6, 2022
White lilac blooming in the rain. A hummingbird buzzes my propped-up boots, his crimson gorget the brightest thing in the hollow.
September 2, 2021
And just like that, it’s autumn: clear and cool, the meadows yellow with goldenrod. A hummingbird visits the Mexican sunflower. How long till she’s off to Mexico herself?
August 25, 2021
In the dawn light, a hummingbird double-checks that I’m not a flower, hovering over my head like a wild thought.
August 19, 2021
Breezy with sometime sunshine. A hummingbird’s buzz grows louder as she hovers in front of a window, bill to bill with an unexpected rival.
August 14, 2021
Cloudy and cool. A hummingbird buzzes in, and I wonder if she’s the same one I saw in the woods yesterday sitting on a branch, almost still.