Report: September 29

It was the Feast of St. Michael which means that twelve years ago, my mother died. The ivory billed woodpecker is extinct again and the long dream of progress is over.

A friend called while I was making salad to report a monarch on a goldenrod stalk. What did I think she should do?

We talked, and pondered what we know. Orange, thus inedible. Late emergent or tired migrant does it matter?

She left it under a hosta with a nectar bouquet. In the morning, it was gone, we told ourselves, on its way