spring collection

for the season here's a collection of words for Spring.


spring off

as Ohioans we are accustomed to temperature extremes
i remember my mom telling me that in 1937 it snowed on
the fourth of july
weather change is the wild goat that lurks before it charges
now this year spring is May
we can go ahead and pencil it in

after winter's farewell snow
on gusty winds entered the warmer air with a
deep blue sky as backdrop for mammoth clouds tumbling fair
unleashing lawns, trees, bushes and flowers, nesting birds and buds
fresh and underway
nature reborn
this new season has begun

you can water golf courses and keep them pristine
but it's nothing, nothing like the clean
gleam of full young spring

spring arrived
wore my big coat the other day
spring arrived just yesterday
it blew in on silent wings
and hovered above the neighborhood
before wrappinig down around us

now it's hot, in a t-shirt today
i heard the boys call outside playing
there are green buds
and singing birds nest building

it's sometimes still winter
after the snows melt
but i'm sure
it's steady spring at last
when i leave a window open

the shallow cove

the shallow cove narrows
by brushes and thickets
our old row boat sparkles
under sunned running waters

when spring floods the low lands
all return and rebuild
for memories run deeper
than fat fish go up stream


spring to chaos

spring to chaos
stuffed with energy
here to the brim, back again
carried by people
in sighing light wind
laughing brght colors
leaping over piazzas
honking from buses
blue shadow and makeup
wine served with pizza
the short-skirted on mini-stilts
tap-tap clicking down old alleys in heels
checkered cloth and waiters
bells chime the hour
to the cobblestone sun
coffee at outside tables
amid smiling faces
talk a lot


folly of spring

here i am, there are no geese.
must i go looking
in the usual places
where they congregate,

i don’t think so;
they can wait
and better they do,
a lesson for them all.

they know only their own reflection in the lake.
if they can recall other than their own image,
let them vent their wings and
see if they can find me.

a walk on the pier will show me many fish,
occasional mouth open bobbers and long swelling floaters,
but i don’t want to encounter any geese;
not that way, not today, not yet anyway.


root spring

from roots deep we spring
as child with family and pets,
friends, cousins, uncles and aunts.
in school and holidays, we grow

a spinning maze
overlapped and interlaced
in motion. when in a flash
we're old and recall gone days

then in a breath
we are back
to where are
our roots





after winter's farewell snow
on gusty winds entered the warmer air with a
deep blue sky as backdrop for mammoth clouds tumbling fair
unleashing lawns, trees, bushes and flowers, nesting birds and buds
fresh and underway
nature reborn
this new season has begun