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
May 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.
April 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.
April 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.
April 2, 2012
Out in time for the second sunrise, when the sun clears the near ridge and appears among the trees, an impossible blossom.
March 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.
March 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.
March 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.
February 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.
February 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.
February 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.
January 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.
January 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.
December 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.