High Noon in the Field

If it's summer, I like it hot and dry and blindingly sunny with sharp black shadows and the white-hot susurrations of insects at noon.

N. and I went down to the old archaeological site area for class this  morning and painted in the shade of the sawmill until half-past noon.  On the way down there we heard and then saw a red-winged blackbird on a post.  It seemed to be a young one not quite adept at flying as it sat for a long enough

                                                                                                                         time to be drawn.

The field itself -- shimmering young wheat heads on top of light green stalks --came to an abrupt stop at the woods, inky darkness swallowing the light.

We walked back home under the noonday sun, like mad dogs and Englishmen, and found hidden Alpine strawberries in a small profusion under the leaves  of what I had thought were old barren strawberry plants near the  blueberries.