Windy and warm for late October. Cumulous clouds accumulate. Tulip-tree samaras comes spinning into the yard like a drone swarm, but one that seeds life rather than death. The kak-kak-kak of a Cooper’s hawk.
wind
Overcast and cold. A white-throated sparrow sings in the wind. Kinglets forage, fluttering and wheezing, through the golden crown of a black birch.
Blue holes open and close in the clouds. Gray squirrels continue to sound the alarm for a long-gone hawk as the tulip sapling in my yard dances in the wind.
More clouds than sun, with walnut trees undressing in the wind, and the leaves on the porch turning over like restless sleepers. The periodic bang of a walnut landing on the back roof is loud as a gunshot.
Cool and mostly clear, with a wind that keeps the shadows in motion—and the blue jays, too. Each hard gust brings another few acorns rattling down, and the driveway is filling in with walnuts.
Breezy and cold. The tuilp poplars wear their new, pale green leaves like robes of feathers, all in motion under the gray sky. I catch a glimpse of accipiter wings, hear the kak-kak-kak call of a Cooper’s hawk.
A cold wind and enough clouds to keep frost at bay, though I doubt the tender young leaves and blossoms will be so lucky tonight. A winter wren burbles by the springhouse. High on the trunk of the big tulip tree, the white breast of a brown creeper inches skyward.
Brick-red clouds barely move as a relentless wind rummages through the trees and shrubs on the ridgeside. A thin slice of moon gets lost among tossing limbs.
Thaw. The snowpack has shrunk by about half, and the snowplowed banks that flank the road have opened their dark dirt hearts. The gray sky turns faintly pink as the wind picks up.
Bright and bitter cold, with a wind obsessively rearranging the snow. A ragged oak leaf comes tumbling out of the woods and skitters up the road, following a stripe of sunlight.
Wind hissing in the pines. A titmouse’s monotonous call. The distant tone cluster of a train horn. A white-breasted nuthatch pipes up.
Quiet except for the wingbeats of a raven. When the icy breeze dies, my breath begins to freeze to my glasses. Sun-sparkles in the snow fall victim to a bank of clouds.
Cold, windy, and mostly clear for the hour between sunrise and the actual appearance of the sun. Wriggling my fingers for warmth, I watch a small cloud acquiring a glow as it sails off east.
Last night’s snow is still falling as wind sweeps through the forest, shaking the trees down. Meltwater drips from the porch roof. Rhododendron leaves, no longer tightly curled against the cold, shimmer in the sun.