Spots of blood in the snow at the woods’ edge. An odd, foot-long circumflex hangs in the top branches of the lilac like a snowy mustache.
lilac
December 21, 2008
November 23, 2008
November 13, 2008
November 10, 2008
The urgent grunts of a buck in rut chasing two does through the laurel, their movements easy to follow now that the trees are nearly bare.
October 28, 2008
The French lilac, unseasonably green; Japanese barberries flaunting too-numerous fruit; me with my steaming Ethiopian brew, rain in my face.
October 8, 2008
Clouds at dawn change from red to orange to pale yellow, like black gum trees in reverse. A towhee lands in the lilac—a splash of rose.
September 25, 2008
No yellow in the lilac yet, but a growing spectrum of greens. Random clatters from the new house site, where a green metal roof is going up.
September 19, 2008
Gold is spreading from the goldenrod up into the trees, here and there: walnut, elm, birch. A jay dives into the lilac: blue from the sky.
August 9, 2008
50°F. A daddylonglegs descends a goldenrod stem, slow as the minute hand on a clock. A catbird bursts from the lilac, crackling with alarm.
July 10, 2008
A phoebe darts and hovers, gleaning insects off the wet weeds. Yesterday, I watched a phoebe help feed four catbird fledglings in the lilac.
June 23, 2008
Four titmice flit about the yard. The dead elm twigs that are closest to the lilac have acquired a greenish tinge. A beetle’s zigzag flight.
June 12, 2008
Sun in the treetops where a catbird improvises. From the lilac, the song of a towhee, incorporated seconds later into the catbird’s stream.
May 28, 2008
The flower heads on the white lilac are half-brown now. Two phoebes take turns flying into the bush, momentarily quelling insistent peeps.