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The Morning Porch

Daily short takes from an Appalachian hollow

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moths

June 12, 2012 by Dave Bonta

An indigo bunting lands on a grass stalk and sinks from view. A white moth on a white column trembles for an instant when the rain returns.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags indigo bunting, moths, rain 1 Comment
April 15, 2012April 15, 2012 by Dave Bonta

Breezy and cool. Small white moths—or are they flower petals?—flutter against the grey sky. A field sparrow’s ascending notes.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags field sparrow, moths 2 Comments
September 9, 2011 by Dave Bonta

A mottle-winged moth flops like a fish across the floor. A mosquito tries to drill through denim, her hind-most legs like levers going up.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags mosquito, moths 2 Comments
September 10, 2010 by Dave Bonta

The corpse of a moth flaps upside-down against the column. Beyond the springhouse, a broken branch dangles—the leaves’ pale undersides.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags black locust, moths, springhouse
August 1, 2010 by Dave Bonta

Like a maple key out of season, but far lighter, it spirals ever so slowly down onto the porch floor: a small white moth’s hind wing.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags moths
September 12, 2025June 19, 2009 by Dave Bonta

Another dark morning. The wood pewee makes a rare visit to the edge of the yard, sings one, sad note, and snaps a brown moth out of the air.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags eastern wood pewee, moths 1 Comment
May 23, 2009 by Dave Bonta

The lilacs are fading fast. Where did the spring go? A hummingbird moth pays court to the dame’s-rockets—the new avatars of purple scent.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags dame's-rocket, hummingbird sphinx moth, lilac, moths

Sunrise. A white moth and a white…

April 26, 2009 by Dave Bonta

Sunrise. A white moth and a white butterfly flit between the cherry blossoms, and at the edge of the woods, the shadblow is in full bloom.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags moths, sunrise

5:00 am; the stars are bright….

August 31, 2008 by Dave Bonta

5:00 am; the stars are bright. Orion straddles the ridge, and as I watch, a meteor streaks from his belt. A small, dark moth circles my face.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags moths, Orion
June 17, 2008 by Dave Bonta

A catbird solos in the half-light while wood thrushes trade lines. Small white moths visit the dame’s-rocket. Today, a funeral and a picnic.

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Categories Plummer's Hollow Tags catbird, dame's-rocket, moths, wood thrush
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On This Day

  • February 22, 2025
    The sun! A robin answers the Carolina wren as a pileated woodpecker hammers away at a hollow black walnut tree.
  • February 22, 2024
    Overcast at sunrise, but the cloud lid lifts enough for the sun to glimmer through when it crests the ridge. Saturday’s snow is looking threadbare—a…
  • February 22, 2023
    Just enough thinning of clouds for a classic, red-in-the-morning wash of mauve in the east, where quarry trucks are loud with their first loads.
  • February 22, 2022
    Gray with occasional showers. Distant crows. The face that I can’t unsee in the big red maple trunk with its expression of perpetual dismay.
  • February 22, 2021
    Snowstorm. The hammer-blows of a pileated woodpecker on what must be a very hollow dead tree. How annoyed I’d be if it were a human…

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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