Cheer, cheer, cheer, cheer, cheer,
the cardinal, relentless
in these darkest times.

Under dawn leaf buds,
there is no resolution —
the stars are still out.

It starts to set in,
spring winds trying to blow in,
the fleeting blue skies.

Trout lily and moss
colonies under our feet,
feeding the season.

Skunk cabbage shoulders
nudging out of the spring swamp
for winter-hungry deer.

All of spring is here:
the slow rejuvenation
of the forest pond.

Voices of birds float
above true forget-me-nots,
yellow buttercup.

I had six goslings
now I am mourned, struck, broken—
this year on the pond.

Silken, like a bloom,
the stream of forget-me-nots,
in earliest spring.

Next to its dead mate,
the silent mourning goose sits,
just as spring begins.

My mother and I
stop to admire these tulips,
they scent the courtyard.

Like a monument,
engraved with marks from each year,
the gray-barked beech stands.

Rain coming all day,
the trillium’s soft shoulders
spread out — unburdened.

The trillium stands
in the soft April forest,
its yellow heart glows.

One after the next,
Bloodroot springs up on this slope,
blue jays call and call.

Twin century trees,
one falls before the other,
lies like a shadow.

Green moss wreaths each tree,
river flows with melted snow,
spring’s foot in the door.

The first of April,
he’s been waiting all winter,
this Robin, singing.

Tender pussywillows,
soon there will be kinglets perched,
at home in this world.

Like a springtime deer,
soft-bodied and velvety—
cattail at the pond.