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Bathed in drizzle at dawn, I walk down to the river without
coffee or shower, the haze of slumber not yet fully lifted.
Light slowly leaks into a dingy sky, creeps silently without
wind as fugitive wisps of ragged clouds drag mist across
hills of dew-lit grass. All is a muted charcoal smudge,
a sketchbook scribble. Deep within the fog, on a leaden
millpond framed by a fretwork of gray tree-branch
shadows, geese softly echo each other, hoarsely igniting
a pallid morning.
As I walk along the Farmington River at dusk, the most delightfully otherworldly and bizarre sounds pulse from the swamps in a kind of crepuscular symphony. I find the indecipherable chorus strangely elevating. It takes me out of normal audio range to a language too primal for words. Rubber band twangs, gurgling trills, the sound of jingling sleigh bells when the peepers are calling. It’s not just the ground that isn’t solid in the bog. Filled with amphibian shouting the very air jiggles like Jell-O. And yet, for all its mystery and strangeness, frogs speak our language. It’s all about sex, territory, and chitchat on the changing weather.
