A sodden baby woodchuck plows through the dripping garden and tumbles over the wall. A smell of burning plastic on the breeze.
rain
A ten-minute downpour. In its aftermath, the ruby-throated hummingbird’s eponymous throat patch rising like a small sun from the weeds.
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.
Random lilac, red maple and black cherry leaves have flipped over, exposing their pale undersides—evidence of a downpour in the wee hours.
Each glaucous leaf of the bleeding-heart has rolled its rain into one fat bead. I’m wondering: where have all the wood thrushes gone?
A light drizzle. The one green leaf at the end of a branch on the otherwise dead cherry shakes itself dry and turns back into a hummingbird.
An accelerated tapping on the roof—who ordered rain? One bird says Konkerlee, another, Drink your tea. Takes me a second to sort them out.
A morning so dark, the spring peepers call between showers. At the wood’s edge, slow as a dream, a blue-headed vireo repeats its only line.
Incessant rain. A chitter of goldfinches halfway through their molt: part green, part yellow, like spicebush or forsythia in reverse.
The red maple blossoms are open at last, puffs of red anthers or orange pollen. A white-throated sparrow sings without stopping in the rain.
Despite the steady rain and continued cold, the first daffodils are out around the dog statue, limp yellow frocks sodden against the ground.
The porch is sleek with blown rain. Just past dawn I glimpse a small hawk circling low over the trees—long-tailed accipiter, a dark cross.
Cold and dawn-dark at 8:30. The ridge disappears into cloud, allowing me to imagine real mountains—a fastness far from anything but rain.
Cold, gray and rainy. I’m wearing my spring coat, but it could be November, except for the pussy willow catkins—those glimmering furs.