Spring flowers, autumn moon;
summer breezes, winter snow:
With mind uncluttered,
this is the finest season.–Wumen Huikai
Spring is, in some respects, the most interesting season. No longer sluggish and gelid like molasses in January, rootlets slurp un-solid moisture, melt hoarded sugars, send sap skyward to awakened buds. Scrawny mammals creep forth, fat burned off in slow subterranean fires. Birds turn attention from survival of self to propagation of species. The skies teem with weather, feather and call. And all so wonderfully day-by-day dynamic for we the watchers and sometime stewards.
Squirrel that just days ago prayed to earth spirits for relief
or warmed its toes on an accommodating cousin
now enjoys renewed access to cached provender
and a moment of satiated bliss:
Receding snows reveal well-preserved treasure where burrowing voles fare not
as a robin finds soft scratching and plenty of dazed worms.
Above, wood ducks seek and chase in high branches,
while below, new-paired bluebirds shop for family quarters
inspecting both nursery and neighborhood:
While rimed azaleas test the uncertain weather before fully committing to flower,
this early magnolia bets all on a chance to seduce the first-flying beetles for pollination
and offers a cardinal now concerned less with dining,
and more with mating, a prominent podium:
