How shall I say this –
spring has come too fast this year.
They should revoke my poetic license –
no amount of green or bursting buds
or fruit-tree fashion shows
can inspire me.

After a dress-rehearsal-for-summer day –
beating sun, dive-bombing birds,
evening fireworks, a dirt-splattering,
culvert-washing storm –
we return to April rain,
soft, steady, soaking,
a nurturing wash.

It comforts me in its way,
I who approach one of those dread-naught birthdays,
who identify with fewer things young,
whose body and senses have begun
to slide down a rain-slicked slope.

And through the self-pity something shines –
maybe lightens is a better word –
struggling through obstinate gray,
translucent slate, monochrome of heaven,
not to dazzle or squint, but to look up
into the drizzle of spring,
a light fighting to cut into the day.

10/07/2001

Posted on 10/07/2001
Copyright © 2026 Bruce W Niedt