When Catkins Crouch

My youth returns when furry catkins crouch
Upon a swaying amber willow wand.
Again I am a child and go in search
Of whistle-making wood by creek or pond.
But hark! I hear a willow-whistle blast--
My grandson telling spring is here at last.

Bronze Hour

From winter's crystal castle through the door
March left ajar, blond April trips again,
Calling to sleeping streams and trees before

She emerald-carpets all her glad domain.
What joy to hear the laughter of the hills,
The singing of the prairies through the rain!

The golden goblets of the daffodils
Hold spring's cologne. The lark sends from his flute
A fount of splashing stars in cadenced trills.

Filled with a beauty-ecstasy, as mute
And motionless I stand at the bronze hour
Of dawn, my heart-songs silently salute,

In awe, the Great Creator. By His power
The sun bursts forth, a blinding amber flower.

Upon the Lap of Spring

Youth kneels to death
not daring to shake off the binding gyves
and stand free.
(Why search for an oasis in the desert
with only the spectral Joshua-arms outreaching?)

It is a tragic thing
to see youth, dreamless,
walk with the step of an old man
while April violins are calling
and stars are singing in their courses.

It is a tragedy
when autumn lies dead upon the lap of spring.

A Brown Leaf Clinging

Knowing the autumn and your need--
I, too, am a brown leaf clinging--
I would bring you April seed
In new green phrases with a bluebird singing.
I know the dark of your grief, your yearning,
Knowing your April and June are gone;                                        
Yet there is peace in the slow returning ...
"Dust to dust" ... but preludes Dawn.
I would bring you resurgent newness:
A crocus venturing a greening slope,
A white gull wheeling against the blueness,
A lily-bloom of unconquerable hope--
Yet will a blown leaf, part of earth,
Feel the tremor of spring's rebirth.

Someone Is Coming

Someone is coming
Over the hill,
Golden her laughter
As wild daffodil.

Someone comes dancing
Over the land
A lithe* catkinned willow
The wand in her hand.

Someone who waited
For winter to pass
Is singing her name
In rain on the grass.

Someone delightful
Advances, we know,
For in her footprints
The violets grow.

Rinsed by a shower,
His flute crystal-clear,
A glad lark is calling,
"April is here!"

* Earlier version (before Path to Home) uses "little" instead of "lithe"

Lift Your Eyes

With eyes downcast in grief and doubt,
Slowly I walked a country lane.
I failed to hear the joyous shout
Of springtime after April rain--
A violet in greening sod
Whispered, "Lift your eyes to God."

The very greenness whistled then;
My ears received the robin's call;
My thoughts escaped their stagnant fen
To hear a laughing waterfall--
My heart held room for no regrets
Weaving a lei of violets.

In Lilac Time

I see the wonder still in Granny's eyes

And breathe the scent of lilacs in her room

As she recrossed the plains with desert skies

Parching the sands. Caressing sprays of bloom,

She reminisced: "What joy to know a part

Of springtime in our beautiful Nauvoo--*

A lilac root--was in the handmade cart

Pulled by my John and me to flower-strew

The cabin we would build on prairie sod."

The miracle of bloom taught Gran love's way

To turn grief's path of tears to lead to God;

To whisper secrets in a bride's bouquet;

To walk with beauty. When a killdeer-chime

Was her 'clear summons to God's friendly loam,'

She closed her eyes to rest in lilac time,

Holding a spray of lilacs to take Home.

*(Nauvoo, a city in Illinois.)