aching toward spring

spring bugles, I nap

this winter cold has come and stayed awhile,

so that it’s cost more to heat the house

and fewer plants outside have tempted probability

by an early budding out toward bloom,

the trees are still bare

and hesitant daffodils bide their time

where they fear the cold

and only release their joy where it’s the safest,

the crocus around the house do not hesitate

and on a warm day blossom after blossom

quietly shouts that spring will come,

spring peppers call loudly as if all were waiting in unison

until a switch was thrown  by future tadpoles who want to be,

birds and squirrels seem to have the same switch turned-on,

when liquid dared to come north from the Gulf in clouds,

it recently covered the ground in white

and finished as an icy sheen upon everything,

I worked to photograph cherry and dogwood branches

as the clarity of ice-encased buds ached to remember last year’s hope

for a tomorrow that will bear a sweet future,

the garden is tilled 

and hard at work incorporating fall’s leaves 

in the plans for summer,

inside my first tomatoes have a month start in plans for summer
and exhibit their first true leaves,

bear and bud and frog have slept so they’re ready to wake

whereas we humans have worked through the winter

and fought entropy with lights and heated rooms,

and lists of chores that must be done,

now, as the natural world wakes up,

we are tired and need to retreat

just as spring bugles that it’s time to charge,

this year, again, I feel the disjoint

between nature’s energy and my need for a nap.

by Henry H. Walker

February 25, ’14