Three-quarter Moon in its move towards setting drops in the West below the thick cloud of the day’s coming storm and into open sky, and a perfect lunar rainbow springs onto the opposite horizon over Muleshoe where dawn will come. It’s the last morning of tending to irrigation at sunrise, for the electric rates for the pumping change over today to “winter hours” and cannot be engaged except in the middle part of the day.
A flock of returning Brewer’s Blackbirds passes overhead, telling of Fall no matter how much the workday’s challenging heat and sweat denies it.
Grosbeaks and Bell’s Vireos might still be about as pastorale fades after a spectacular sunset, but there isn’t a nighthawk to be seen at The Stockpond. Not very long ago the Chats would’ve been tuning their orchestra under such a Moon, but there is no singing now but from the mosquitoes. Dove wings come whistling through the muggy air, in the heat that is stupefying even after dark.