At sunrise, two bird calls I associate with early spring: blue-headed vireo and chickadee. But the breeze is warm, the sun a lurid orange.
sunrise
5/3/2012
Sun struggles through the humid air: a golden glow. The leaves look twice as big as yesterday, animated by the buzzy calls of warblers.
4/27/2012
The sun clears the ridge and disappears behind a dark lid of clouds. The wind which a moment before felt envigorating is now simply cold.
4/6/2012
Clear and cold at sunrise. A nuthatch on the dark side of the tall tulip poplar reverses course and ascends into the sunlit crown.
4/2/2012
Out in time for the second sunrise, when the sun clears the near ridge and appears among the trees, an impossible blossom.
3/27/2012
Woodpeckers drumming at sunrise. It occurs to me that they might not be telegraphing “I am here” so much as verifying that the world is.
3/26/2012
A cold wind at sunrise. Daffodils nod, while the forsythia shakes its yellow fingers in a vaguely apotropaic gesture. Hard frost on the way.
3/17/2012
Ground fog up in the field glows faintly orange in the sunrise. Under the old dog statue, a cartoon yelp of yellow: the first daffodil.
2/21/2012
Sunrise. The bluebird warbles once, as if unsure whether it really will be that kind of day. The cardinal keeps singing his one good note.
2/13/2012
The wistful two notes of the chickadee’s spring song. The gray clouds begin to turn pink. A rabbit dashes into the lilac when I stand up.
2/1/2012
Dark clouds part in the west, flooding the yard at sunrise with sunset light. A log furred with white fungi glows in the snow-free woods.
1/29/2012
This could be March, were it not for the late, slow-rising sun. The powerline right-of-way is a band of yellow light through the dark woods.
1/7/2012
If I hold my head perfectly still, I can watch the sun move through the winter woods, climbing from limb to limb toward the untrammeled sky.
12/25/2011
Cloudless at sunrise, and the yard a-glitter with frost. It’s dead silent, save for the stream’s gurgle and a raven croaking high overhead.