In Very Early Spring
In the very early spring
when the air is still
and the morning light sharp
and blue and cool
and the smooth shadows long
and the grass is not yet green
there washing in the dimness
small patches of snow & ice
living in the ditches and folds of earth
under ridges burdened with grass
behind heavy roots tangled and strewn
bracing large old trees with their whiteness
these apparitions
like pools of memory
are coursing remainders
flowing and shaping themselves
avoiding the low lying morning sun
reveling in their silence and time.
The bright air runs down over them
and through them with assurance
that the time has not yet come
of summer's suffocating heat
that will reach even them
so delicately lain
at the winter's end.
East Lansing
March, 1991
East Lansing Series
©1991 In Very Early Spring — Joseph W. Yarbrough
Reproduction prohibited without written permission.
when the air is still
and the morning light sharp
and blue and cool
and the smooth shadows long
and the grass is not yet green
there washing in the dimness
small patches of snow & ice
living in the ditches and folds of earth
under ridges burdened with grass
behind heavy roots tangled and strewn
bracing large old trees with their whiteness
these apparitions
like pools of memory
are coursing remainders
flowing and shaping themselves
avoiding the low lying morning sun
reveling in their silence and time.
The bright air runs down over them
and through them with assurance
that the time has not yet come
of summer's suffocating heat
that will reach even them
so delicately lain
at the winter's end.
East Lansing
March, 1991
East Lansing Series
©1991 In Very Early Spring — Joseph W. Yarbrough
Reproduction prohibited without written permission.