In thin fog, the soft notes of juncos and white-throated sparrows taking their morning baths in the shelter of a dogwood beside the springhouse.
white-throated sparrow
10/2/2021
Mares’ tails reddening in the east. The reedy songs of white-throated sparrows. A raven’s nasal croak.
12/24/2020
White sky and white ground meet in a blur of fog. Above the drumming of rain on the roof, a white-throated sparrow’s minor-key song.
10/16/2020
Rainy and cold. White-throated sparrows call in different keys, each more plaintive than the last. The birches are fluttery with kinglets.
1/2/2020
Slow trickle of water in the ditch. Weak sun. My mom stops by to talk about logging and politics, and how the old field is full of sparrows.
12/21/2019
Soft sun. Birds flit through the weeds beside the springhouse. A white-throated sparrow sings just the first, wavery note of his song.
11/13/2019
Juncos’ soft whistles. A white-throated sparrow’s melancholy song. The joyful shrieks of our neighbors’ four-year-old grandchildren.
4/18/2019
The croak of a raven skimming the treetops. A white-throated sparrow fresh from bathing in the stream grooms itself in the weak sunshine.
11/21/2018
A singing contest between white-throated sparrows. Newly fallen oak leaves skitter back and forth on the snow under the trees.
11/19/2018
In my left ear, the sound of traffic going through the gap. In my right, white-throated sparrow, nuthatch, raven, jay. It looks like rain.
11/17/2018
Where the stream fans out beside the springhouse, birds hop down the snowbanks and into the water to bathe: sparrows, juncos, Carolina wren.
10/24/2018
Cold wind. A white-throated sparrow sings its plaintive, quavering song and falls silent. I sit in the reek of dogshit from my boot.
10/14/2018
Cold and heavily overcast. A jay switches from his own call to red-tailed hawk, then chickadee. In the meadow, white-throated sparrows.
4/15/2018
Under the sort of sky poets call sullen, a robin’s relentless bowl of cheer. Leave it to the white-throated sparrow to add a wistful note.