April 2020 might not look like past years: the bright green of new grasses, the pinks and creams of flowering fruit trees, sunny daffodils, Easter-colored tulips. Maybe you haven’t been out to see the lambs gamboling in the country or noticed the sparrows building nests. Maybe that orange isn’t the blooming California poppies but the fake tan on President Trump as he makes himself actor, director and producer of Coronavirus—It’ll Go Away Soon so Just Forget It.
Even if you’re sheltering in place, you can turn off the horror show, step outside and watch Spring. Pull some weeds or tie up your spent daffodils. Rake up the dropped camellias. Pick daisies. Watch your trees unfurl new leaves. Tweet with the chickadees, listen to the doves. Count the crows—there’s one more than last year. Take a breath, let it out slowly. Feel the renewing energy of the season, and let go of your anxiety. Now find a sunny corner and read a poem. Or better yet, write a poem. It’s Poetry Month after all. Nothing is as healing as a good dose of nature and poetry!
The Dilemma of the Quercus—Or—Oak Erotica
You elongate your catkins,
male flowers dangled
from the tips of your naked limbs
in seduction of the wind before Spring
unfurls your pink or chartreuse canopy.
Your few females tuck up at the crook
Nondescript, awaiting the ecstasy of pollen.
Monoecious yet self-incompatible
you must count on your distant-relations
standing near, and the hillsides
abreeze in ochre, or the powdered
buzz of native bees
to deliver the yellow dust
that pollinates life into your acorns
to grow fine new trees.
Find this and many more poems in my latest chapbook available on Amazon.
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