Daily Evidence

A writer’s journal records the data that invites larger stories

In early April the birds begin to filter aloft. At first a trickle, then a river. On a big night, two million birds fly over Grafton County, New Hampshire, where I live. I lie awake after midnight picturing them overhead, wings working, eyeing one another, twittering, a vast fortuitous flock.

There are sparrows and warblers, waterfowl and hawks, thrushes and flycatchers and wrens and thrashers. Male Robins sweep through early, kicking up turf to fuel their flight to Newfoundland. Soon little brown birds sprinkle the lawn, white-crowned, white-throated, streaked and chirping. A pair of American Bluebirds examines our nesting boxes before a House Wren claims them both, comically possessive. Small dramas.