May.
The stick in the back we thought was dead
Swarms with green specks.
Forsythia,
Herald of spring,
Blew her bugle, violent yellow,
And now
The dull bush sprays
Snowy panicles over the path,
Night-fragrant, radiant, reckless of bloom,
The dead earth sends forth
Tender shoots, obedient legions,
Myriad, sunwise, standards vert unfurling,
The brown sward swells,
Transmutes to green,
Moist, untrodden, cushion-plump.
Winter’s siege has lifted.
Above a frilled leaf, a coral drop trembles.
The checkered fritillary droops.
The poppy rustles, cellophane, transparent.
We mark the evolution of our landscape daily,
We ache for every bud to burst, tendril stretch, leaf uncurl.
How many times must Proserpina mount her stair before we can remember
The climax was this evanescence?
Congratulations on a very fine poem. I especially like the unexpected way in which line 17 echoes line 1. (I number these on the assumption that "May" is the title, not line 1 itself.)
ReplyDeleteLine 1, then, begins with an iamb and an anapest, "the stick in the back." I liked that when I first read it, and was struck by it again when I encountered it at line 17. "Above a frilled leaf."
Line 1 is "May."
ReplyDeleteTitle of poem is also "May"--see post title.
Thanks for your kind words.