Yellow-green sparks shimmer among shadowy pines overlooking my backyard on the outskirts of Saranac Lake. It is a warm June evening, and the humid air hangs heavy with the fragrance of mountain maple blossoms and last year’s fallen pine needles. More such flashes beckon from the quiet tree-lined road that circles Moody Pond, and I follow.
As my eyes adjust to the darkness, the smooth pond on my left becomes smoked glass with a ragged black rim of mirrored forest that is sparsely dotted with porch lights and the occasional streetlamp. Above and below the rim, countless stars glisten amid the spilled milk of our galaxy, where fireflies who stray from shore resemble wandering meteors.
Frogs call from dark beds of pickerelweed along the shore, their voices bouncing up from the pond in variable sequences like pebbles skipping on water, while the bullfrogs grunt more slowly, as if sawing low notes from a cello. These are songs of love, or whatever passes for it among frogs. They also warn competitors and misguided suitors from differing species to back off. The sparkling fireflies do much the same in a language of light.
