poison ivy

Wednesday November 23, 2011

Dave Bonta November 23, 2011 2

A pile of fresh dirt at the woods’ edge: a groundhog has dug a den under the roots of a poison ivy-throttled maple. Will he itch all winter?

Dave Bonta September 28, 2010

How does the poison ivy know to turn the same salmon as the red maple it has infiltrated? A phoebe chases a kinglet from the roadside weeds.

Yet another clear, cool day. A goldfinch sings, almost through his molt. Even the builders' power saw sounds autumnal. …

Like hair on a head the way the stiltgrass falls about in orderly whorls. A raven flies over, hoarse cries out of sync with its wingbeats. …

A monarch butterfly en route to Mexico glides over the house, past the orange leaves on the last living branch of a hollow maple. …

A new bloom of gnats—I saw them swarming by the back door—and the yard is full of fall warblers, foraging with the chickadees and titmice. …

Even unseen, the raven crying rawk rawk from high overhead makes the flat white sky more interesting. In the yard, a monarch's regal orange. …

A faint smell of sewage on the wind. A wren singing from atop the springhouse in the absence of a female supplies his own call-and-response. …

Goldfinch, nuthatch, catbird, wren. The herb-garden chipmunk, cheeks bulging, pauses on top of the wall to groom its paws. …

A dozen vultures fresh from their communal roost circle low overhead, wings shining white whenever they tilt toward the sun—angels of death. …

A meadow vole takes an after-death journey into the forest in the jaws of a cat, who holds her head high for once and does not slink. …

A succession of anxious or querulous calls—nuthatch, crow, Cooper's hawk, pileated woodpecker—until sunrise reddens the western ridge. …

Clear and cold. I follow my breath as it drifts over the ridges and valleys of the tin roof sheltering the oil tanks. A patter of acorns. …

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. …