Clear and cool. A migrant wood thrush calls softly at first light. It’s very still. Then the wrens wake up.
wood thrush
July 27, 2023
A wood thrush is singing in the distance. I shoo away the mosquito singing in my ear to listen.
July 12, 2023
Cool enough to seem autumnal, but for the wood thrush and hooded warbler calling from the woods’ edge and the hummingbirds buzzing in the bergamot.
June 24, 2023
Foggy at dawn for the wood thrush’s solo. The wild garlics are beginning to raise their egret heads.
June 5, 2023
Cool with thin clouds. Two wood thrushes fly into the woods, dead grass trailing from the leader’s beak. A chipmunk runs under my chair.
May 28, 2023
Filmy-winged insects drift through rays of sun. A wood thrush comes out into the meadow, hopping like a robin along the edge of the drive.
May 16, 2023
Another deliciously cool dawn. A wood thrush on the far side of the yard sings a simplified, less ethereal version of their call—the result no doubt of having been raised too close to traffic or industrial noise.
May 7, 2023
Dawn. Strips of cloud redden like a ladder of blood. But for sheer augury, nothing can top a blossoming hawthorn at the forest edge issuing a torrent of wood thrush song.
May 1, 2023
Cold and half-clear for a red sunrise. The stream is still quiet—more raininess than actual rain. From off in the distance, a wood thrush’s ethereal trill.
April 22, 2023
In the half-light, the first white blossoms on the old French lilac look like snow. When the whippoorwill pauses for breath, I can hear the first wood thrush’s ethereal song.
September 21, 2022
Dawn comes with an inversion layer, traffic noise half-smothering the scattered notes of thrushes fresh from their night flights.
September 7, 2022
Half an hour before sunrise, the first migrant wood thrush arrives at the woods’ edge, calling softly. A sneeze gathers in my sinuses.
August 5, 2022
Rain and fog. A wood thrush sings three times and falls silent. A mourning dove goes on and on.
July 30, 2022
Cool and crystal-clear. A wood thrush sings as if it’s still nesting season. The western ridge turns red.