Spring
Fingers of mother earth scrabble upwards
out of the frost-free and unrelenting soil
scattering away the remains of winter’s waste
and the noisome debris of autumn’s revels.
She resurrects the limbs of dormant trees
and awakens the sleepy-head flowers, coaxing
them to come forth with their girlish giggles
and play hopscotch once more with the sun.
In endless dynasties of green skirts, knee-high
sox, and shoes of gold-colored dandelions
she skips the ropes of the equinox in jubilant
abandon and rouses the sleeping fields of grain.
But even spring can be betrayed by vagrant frosts
and freezing rains that conspire with wind to
devastate the plains and rip apart the sheltering
thatch where the nighthawk’s eggs wait to hatch.
It’s through these variable cracks that spring
conspires with sun to outwit the frost and wind
and prepare the soil for the warm, beneficial rain
that will again refresh the world with splendor.