Longer Days

I have survived the winter

The warmth is returning and my body

Unfurls

No longer clenched

Contracted

Its wounds aching, creaky

The very bones protesting

The light is returning, slowly

A few minutes here, a sunbeam there

The nights are cold but you know

Morning

With her birdsongs and cars sputtering to life

Morning will come and bring the sun

The sun will come and bring the warmth

The warmth will come and bring me

Slowly shuffling off the stiffness

Curiosity blooming

.

A few warm days, the rains fall

Then back to the chilly mornings

All of the animals gathering

Tolerating proximity to gain warmth

As long as no one moves too quickly

Coming closer to press against me

Strange bedfellows

In these trying times

.

After the dreams have faded

And the light begins to shift

Something starts to awaken

There in the darkness

It is quiet at first

Shifting, observant

Then all at once

In a flash of wings and blossoms

The song of the spring bursts forth

Calling all hearts

Awaken

.

The thrumming increases

As the temperatures climb

A stillness over everything

Sticky heat slowing the pulse

Sweat winding down

Rivulets seeking streams

Rolling downwards

Gathering in pools

Salty puddles

The breath slows

Ice cubes clink in a square glass

Something calls out for its mate

Shrill notes echo

Reverberate

And fade away

The response is silent

A gap in the soundscape

The place where sound is not

A silence

Where once

There was a voice

.

The winds blow on, the tides

Turning

The rivers flow forth

Wending their winding ways

Ever forward

Some small one

Cries out

Restless

In the night

.

Pushing its way upward

One green shoot

Finds the sky

And opens

Furling its fronds

Slowly

One

Spiky

Branch

Fans out

Waving

Reaching

Seeking

Life