Another long summer’s day is in the wings

Darkness comes reluctantly now, hiding in the new leaves, pausing among the blossoms, waiting in the wake of the summer solstice. It’s as if night is reluctant to dim the bustle of early summer, respecting the need for lingering light for those birds and animals nurturing their young, for the wildflowers blooming, and for stewards of the land tending to their crops.

It’s well after 10 p.m. I can still see a hint of light through portals in the birch tree and pines, and also above them, as twilight slowly deepens east to west. If I rise early, I will see that same murky light well before 5 a.m. There’s not much time between for darkness.

I’ve read that there isn’t total darkness until a couple of hours after our eyes can no longer see light. Total darkness loosens its grip well before dawn, long before our eyes can detect twilight. It’s there, however, and birds sense it, even see it, as they begin chirping in the dark.

The summer solstice is a week past. Though the solstice is the “longest” day of the year, neither the year’s earliest sunrise nor latest sunset occurs on that first day of summer. The earliest sunrise, at 5:15.44 a.m. in these parts, occurred nearly a week before the solstice, and the latest sunset is nearly a week after the solstice, at 9:01.43 p.m., on both June 25 and 26.

I go for a walk on June 25, the paved trail winding toward Chequamegon Bay in flush daylight though only an hour before sunset. Birdsong fills the air, birdsong of red-eyed vireos, redstarts, and robins, all proclaiming this latest sunset as the trail transitions from the hardwoods to the wetlands.

Red-winged blackbirds click and chick in the expanse of cattails on either side of the marsh. A blackbird near me picks up the pace and volume while clinging sideways on a cattail. There is a rustle in the thick stems near the water, and another blackbird lifts away. Was I a nest threat?

The cattail flowerheads were rich brown, firm and smooth, when I walked here last fall. Now they are faded and puffed, looking like so many discarded rags scattered atop the cattails’ green leaves, the leaves waiting for summer’s new headdress.

The swamp widens into a channel of open water, the day’s last light stretching across acres of cattails and lily pads. The entire scene seems to yawn in the soft illumination. I turn around, walking back between flowered guardians on either side of the trail.

Marsh pea is blooming in purple, smooth meadow rue in creamy yellow, blue flag in purplish-blue, and buttercup and narrowleaf hawksbeard both in dazzling yellow. Light lingers on for this show.

In these final days of June, the hours of complete darkness can be counted on one hand. And now at hand, night arrives with ease, gently sending birds to their roost, perhaps on a branch near nests bulging with hatchlings on the verge of fledging.

It sends me to repose. Morning is not far off, beginning with the chirps of robins and chickadees detecting the first ripples of light waves. In near dimness, the chickadee sings. Another long summer’s day is in the wings.

Dave Greschner, retired sports/outdoors editor at the Rice Lake Chronotype, writes about nature and the outdoors, pursues nature photography, and is the author of “Soul of the Outdoors.” He can be reached at davegreschner@icloud.com.