wood thrush – Page 6 – The Morning Porch

July 23, 2009

Dave Bonta July 23, 2009

Come hummingbird and bring some glitter to this damp gray morning, buzz around the bergamot, pizzazz at the beebalm’s one bedraggled bloom.

Dave Bonta July 19, 2009

A morning cold as autumn. At intervals, at the woods’ edge, a red-tailed hawk, orange light, the song of a wood thrush. Here and gone.

Dave Bonta July 10, 2009

A wood thrush sings at dawn; the trees glow faintly pink. What is it about the 3rd-quarter moon that makes it look especially edible?

Dave Bonta June 29, 2009

Wood thrush, when you go back to Honduras, don’t just forage in the campo. Sing like you do here. Let them know how we mourn.

Dave Bonta May 30, 2009

A chipmunk appears on the flat stone beside the porch and stares at me as I hum Shostokovich, its cheeks bulged wide as Dizzy Gillespie’s.

Dave Bonta May 1, 2009

Warm rain. The wood thrushes have returned to sing at the edge of the woods for another year. It’s almost possible to believe in redemption.

Dave Bonta April 28, 2009

Sandals and shirtsleeves. The thin song of a black-throated green warbler. The oaks are blooming, and the air is full of insects.

Dave Bonta September 8, 2008

In the chill of dawn, sounds come as if from a great distance: wood thrush chirping, crow calls, wren twitter, the Monday whine of traffic.

Dave Bonta September 4, 2008 1

At half-light, the scattered calls of migrant wood thrushes, dropping into the trees from their all-night flights and looking for breakfast.

Dave Bonta July 23, 2008

This time of year, every wood thrush song I hear could be the last. I listen hard. Inside on the table, the covers of paperbacks curl up.

Dave Bonta July 2, 2008

First light. A low-frequency buzz passes between the back of my head and the house. Wood thrush song in the distance—an incoming tide.

Dave Bonta June 17, 2008

A catbird solos in the half-light while wood thrushes trade lines. Small white moths visit the dame’s-rocket. Today, a funeral and a picnic.

Dave Bonta May 30, 2008

In one direction, a singing wood thrush; in the other, a red-eyed vireo. Evocative refrain or dull repetition? It’s all in the delivery.

Dave Bonta May 21, 2008

Sun! I hear the crow that thinks it’s a duck, a catbird’s simultaneous translation of a wood thrush song. Last night, I dreamed of bluejays.