A Time of Apple Blossoms and Bluebirds (SWF)

Apple Blossom Rain

Beyond the grass, a long, spindly branch, dotted with lichens, and heavy beneath a small cluster of blossoms at its tip,
reaches out from an old apple tree--
its gnarled trunk struggling now against a large ash, sprouted years ago beside it, and pinning it between its own younger and wider base and a fencepost, propped with stones.
Its purpose, long past, the aging apple.

A remnant from the time when this land and the surrounding acres were farmland.
When broad pastures and the land between them were home to Bluebirds—feeding from the short grass, raising broods of young within holes left by others in the woods’ plentiful dead and dying trees.

Perched from posts,
to glean below, and return.

Before the pastures were turned to home sites,
and the few dead trees left standing filled with more urban, invasive birds.


The nesting boxes on the hill, this year, again are empty—our attempts to be helpful, refused, it would seem. And though the Tree Swallows, soon to arrive, will delight me daily, fly-catching against an evening light, I wait for Bluebird blue—a shade like no other.
If I should name a color, fallen sky.

Bluebird pair on fence posts
(male left, female right)

Bluebird female in grass

Bluebird male on fence posts

Last week I watched,
back and forth,
from post to post,
to ground and back.

And again, days later, still, they stay.
Returning often, as they feed, and fly off.
To somewhere, beyond the grass.

Bluebird male on post

They rest in the busy branches of the ash overhead,
touch briefly the old, reaching apple--
whose few frail fingers, beckon to Bluebirds.

Bluebird male in Ash Tree

Yay--found the nest!
Female Bluebird on branch outside nest hole
in broken locust snag beside another old apple.
(approx. 10' above ground, 6" below top)

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Finding Happiness

Frost on Goldenrod Gall

I hate to intrude--
feel that I've walked rudely into a scene, scattering those already there, sending them rushing for cover.
And, many times, catching their hasty exit in flutters and scrambles, I'll drop to sit, quietly without moving, right where I stood, hoping they'll be more forgiving of my carelessness, as a small lump on the ground.
And return, as if I were not there.

Frost on Ground

Yesterday I stepped off my usual path, and strode purposefully out across the grassy banks of the pond, toward the oak woods. Drunken on sunshine from the brightest blue overhead, delighted that this day, even though again sharply cold, had given itself for me to explore, perhaps more eager than I should have been to be out drinking it in, I startled a small flash of blue, and then another from the young trees at the woods’ edge.

And, though the air was cold, I found the grass already dried and warm, and knelt there, wrapped in my dark jacket, still, waiting surrounded by their branches.
Watching bluebirds.
Finding happiness.




We’ve tried for 3 years to attract bluebirds to nesting boxes in our fields, each time finding none. And though our rural area supports them well, we seldom see any on our land.
I wasn’t expecting to find them here at the edge of the oak woods, and had gone outdoors that morning with only a short lens, planning to photograph the very delicate ice left on the Goldenrod by chilly spring nights.

Perhaps this year, ...bluebirds.

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