Monday April 21 — Spring’s a-game
Easter dinner 60 miles from campus on the farm of Professor Mark Paulik, his wife Helene, and their two children, plus another family (+ smaller children) with splendid food good drink, love and conversation. Six hours, in and out of the house, contemplating pastures where organically raised cows were doing their thing and the children ran and played around the farm yard. The air was beautiful; 74º and sun-soaked breezes. After a while I strolled around the outside of the house taking it all in. That’s the moment, for me, when winter ended. I don’t care whether we get some overnight frosts or another snow storm; winter ended yesterday out there at the farm.
One of many things I love about a serious winter, along with biting winds and swirling snow, and the shape of trees with each tiny leaf-less branch clear against the sky, is its ability to make me long for spring. For me, yesterday was the turning.
What might make a good short poem for today when we return to work? I found an 8 line poem by master poet Robert Frost.
Happy Spring to you.
john sj
Today’s post: “A Patch of Old Snow”
There’s a patch of old snow in a corner
That I should have guessed
Was a blow-away paper the rain
Had brought to rest.
It is speckled with grime as if
Small print overspread it,
The news of a day I’ve forgotten —
If I ever read it.
