As cold as yesterday but with orange-bellied clouds and a wind. A tulip tree seed helicopters into the yard and rises up over the house.
sunrise
Cold sunrise. The green hippogriff of a lilac just starting to yellow. Dry leaves whispering of deer in heat.
Cold and clear at sunrise, with sound out of the east: the quarry’s daily grind instead of the interstate. A jay answers a reverse-beeping truck.
A half hour after sunrise, a rattling in the fallen leaves: raindrops! Slowly accelerating into an actual shower. Which peters out much too soon.
Pale columns of sky all along the ridge. Frost as white as my breath. A rising tide of chirps and trills as sunrise draws near.
Cold and mostly overcast, but the rising sun strikes my face a full hour earlier due to overnight thinning of the leaves.
Overcast with fog that thins out for the purported sunrise. It’s warm enough that one tree cricket trills in the herb garden.
Two degrees below freezing and clear at sunrise. A falling tulip tree leaf lands with an audible tick.
A cold and windy dawn. The crescent moon drowns in a sorcery of pink.
Sun in the treetops and a small flock of migrants just below, catching some breakfast. A chipmunk’s motor slowly runs out of putts.
Sunrise has been delayed by clouds, but I hold out hope. A wren tuts impatiently. A train horn blows a flat minor chord.
Thin fog at sunrise. A pileated woodpecker lands on the side of a tall locust tree and gets bum-rushed by a squirrel.
Sitting on the ridgetop I become subject to the crows’ concern. A pileated woodpecker veers from its course. The sun comes up.
Clouds gravid with rain at sunrise. A wood thrush calls quietly. In the top of the tallest oak, a squirrel’s silhouette begins its descent.