Springtime

In Two Parts

We have at last reached May after a long and colorful April in which I journeyed to the lakes and fields of Michigan and back for a ministry tour with my chorale. It was in the tumult of this wandering minstrel’s life that my harried mind found new inspiration in the familiar yet undeniably special vistas of the Midwest. However, this poem was penned on the back deck of my home in the weeks that preceded the voyage. It is a reaction to this newly green and budding world, as well as an homage to Thomas Gray’s atmospheric verses in Ode on the Spring, a real first-class poem.

I

Wake up your windows

Dipped in strawberry dawn

Rising slow, smooth liquid time

In the rustling, blurring green

So far from the glacial severity,

A world of ice, crystal fantasy,

Floating in the hoarfrost;

The mountain is a river

This new morning.

II

Spring-rose– return of the child,

All that was buried is freed,

The wild balloons are loosed,

The forest floor is cluttered with

Sticks, cool rocks, all in a sweet feeling,

A gliding spirit,

I cannot walk away.