Another Morning in Paradise

26 July 2024: Hurricane Hill (1,100 feet), White River Jct., Vermont

5:23 a.m. 58 degrees, wind NW 6 mph, gusting to 9. The world in motion: the grass, the trees, especially the trees, branches waving in concert, leaves in rhythmic agitation ... a green flow. Halfmoon hangs in the west and fades in the morning light—an altogether refreshing sunrise, the air bracing and clean. I can't take my eyes off the sky. Twelve species of birds, including the first veery in months, and no warblers.

Headliners: red-eyed vireo and American goldfinch. Background vocals: black-capped chickadee, blue jay, white-breasted nuthatch. Thin voices barely audible: cedar waxwing and brown creeper. Signing off at dawn: barred owl, a hollow, guttural, throat-clearing cough as though it had just swallowed a snake.

The clouds move like boats while six crows surf the air stream, wings spread, tail pinched—a controlled drift, rising, falling, tumbling. Crows land on the terminal end of a witch's broom of dead branches, each bird on a naked perch. All caw. One preens ... a piece of breast-down rides the wind, a black boat in a transparent ocean. Five of the crows—one at a time—fly into the green shield of a roadside maple, cawing like banshees. Hunched over, the sixth watches me pass, apparently unconcerned about the recent collapse of the New York Yankees.

Easy breathing on the road home, an autumn morning in late July.