witch hazel

October 20, 2010

Dave Bonta October 20, 2010

I pick the last few unsplit witch hazel nuts in my garden, hoping I can witness their famed explosions. I line them up on top of my monitor.

Dave Bonta October 2, 2010

The witch hazel in my garden is just coming into bloom, yellow tentacles uncurling, the bunched nuts like maledictions waiting to burst.

Dave Bonta October 3, 2008

A song sparrow sings, and suddenly it’s spring again. In the front garden, under browning leaves, the witch hazel dangles spidery blooms.

January 30, 2024
Overcast and quiet except for the watery chorus. A chipmunk dashes across a patch of snow and disappears under the house.
January 30, 2023
The snowpack is holey again. A sunrise sky is visible through the trees on the ridgetop for just a few minutes until the fog descends.
January 30, 2022
Very cold and still. Just when I think the birds will never wake, the clouds redden a little and a nuthatch fires up its querulous…
January 30, 2021
Amorous squeaks of squirrels. A small fissure in the clouds approaches the sun and the frozen landscape brightens for half a minute.
January 30, 2020
As slowly as the sky cleared yesterday morning, today it returns to white, like the growing blankness in my memory where some face had been.