Woke at 5:53am thinking of trout. Last night Louisa and I caught a couple rainbows up at the Trout Club in Weston. Temp dropped quickly throughout the day. Tiny white mayfly hatch again the orange then pink curl-of-wisp distant clouds. A pair of loons quiet in Porter Cove. A single goose gliding in front of our favored green cabin (Hulett). The touch of trout re-orienting in the arch of my hand at the water's surface before returning, once again, into the depths.

Feels like the dog days of August. Afternoon waft from last Tuesday's burn pile somehow smoldering still. It's white cursive lifting from a heap of fine, taupe powder surrounded by thick grass, a circle of seedblown dandelion stems standing guard like spent matchsticks. The fluff has since sailed, collected by the bluebirds, who felt it into the walls of their nests, accenting the white fur of a dog two years gone. Elvis. On a hot day like today, he would have hid in the waiting area of the barn, flat against the concrete, the vacuum pump humming, pulsators clicking, dreaming of snow.

The song of the gray catbird in the apple tree that Louisa has been seducing sounds like brand new sneakers stutter-stepping on a polished hardwood floor. In an empty gymnasium at the end of time or, depending on your perspective, the beginning of goodbye. I've been teaching my girls to flick the wrist, shoot with a high arc, and never forget to follow through. I tell them that if I find, when I die, that there is nothing. I will create something.

The light at 5am fuels the songs of so many unseen birds. From the extended cool of spring to full throttle summer in a day. An hour after I filled and hung my hummingbird feeder, two hummingbirds arrived. One metallic green. The other red-breasted. They sipped in stillness and peered about. A new chapter of wasps weaving every which way, building in every eave toward some eventual. The bottle babies broke out of their pen five times, chasing the neighbors kids out on their first evening bike ride of the season. There is joy in the unscripted many times over. Grilled dinner on the dregs of last fall's propane. The first black fly bite of the year on my shoulder. On Minna's forehead. It doesn't itch, though, dad. Not one bit.

The peepers of Brattleboro. The peepers of Townshend. The coolness vociferates. My mom drove over from Maine. Louisa slipped and reinjured her hip on the unpowerwashed deck. The stars shone bright and stiff. The stream beside the house steadying. In the barnyard, I find Billie. She lost her kid overnight on Tuesday. The girls' shoulders hung up during delivery. Umbilical cord compressed against the pelvic brim. She kept pushing long after I assisted the following morning. Kept pushing into Wednesday and Thursday. Whenever she saw me, it was to fight me off — biomyacin shots, syringed meloxicam to help with the swelling, thiamine when she went off feed and refused to get up. Tonight she flinches and turns away. We listen a little longer to the peepers. I hear them differently since my dad has passed. I scratch Billie's neck. Make a point to linger here. It's not easy making it through, I want to say. This life. She has rejoined the herd now in the upper lean-to. Mouth full of cud. I scratch her neck, her chin. She allows herself to turn toward me. Presses her head now against my arm. I scratch her cheek. All of this is a goddamned gift.

In the western sky the lightest shade of darkness is the first break in cloud cover I've seen all day. Mango is barking incessantly at the rushing brook, which out hollers. On my walk back up from the barnyard after my nightly check on the goats (only a couple left to kid now), I can still see a faint glow from the coals of the brush piles in the fields off in the distance that we lit this morning, a once per year occasion. The rain finally allowed for it, and next week the forecast calls for heat, and sun. Fun to think of how quickly the grass will shoot up after this soaking. Watch it turn the landscape elastic green!

The orioles have been bopping around the blossoms of the apple tree outside our window. It's been a joy watching them all week. The twigs bounce under their weight. Quiet resonance. Their orange bellies against the gray, overcast sky. The on and off rain is a game they mimic.