After a windy night, the forest is looking decidedly threadbare in its coat of many colors, illuminated each time the sun finds a hole in the clouds.
wind
Windy and cold. In the wall of leaves at the woods’ edge, the first few fragments of what will be my winter sky.
Cold wind and rain, belied by all the cheerful yellow starting to move from the goldenrod up into the trees at the woods’ edge.
A warm wind before dawn brings a feeling of dread for the coming week. The sound of a raccoon flipping rocks in the creek.
Drizzle in the wind even as the sky brightens. Small patches of blue appear and disappear. A yellow leaf spirals down into the yard.
Crystal-clear for the first time since the trees leafed out. A breeze riffles through them—shifting curtains of light and shadow.
A dozen dead leaves circle the yard as the clouds’ bellies turn orange. A phoebe calls once, sotto voce, from a branch above the creek.
As above, so below—the ground the same white as the cloud ceiling. My thick hat excludes all but the sound of wind and birds and a train horn’s dissonant chord.
The ground is once again armored in white. Gusts of wind materialize like minor demons, treetops crashing together, dropping dead limbs.
The mid-morning sun in the forecast comes with a scrim of cloud, a breeze, and a raven on the ridgetop going bonk…bonk…bonk…
Overcast with bright openings and the white noise of wind, raising the dead leaves once again, making them fly.
Mid-morning, a lid of clouds slowly closes over the east. Caroling juncos fall silent. The wind picks up.
Wind and rain. In the gray-brown woods, two silent pileated woodpeckers flap from tree to tree, wings like a revelation in black and white.
Two pileated woodpeckers forage for breakfast, resolutely hammering as all the trees around their dead snags rock in the wind.