Feeding Spring

Winter waxes and swells, until it becomes brimming full
Ravines and canyons swell to bursting
Bushes and boulders become nothing but vast, smooth mounds of white
Drifts of diamonds sift against a stretched scintillating skin of snow

But just at the fullest, most surfeited, mounding winter moment
Suddenly . . . comes a small soft relaxing sigh
Followed by a sweet shivered whisper of release
That first tingling thrill; the let-down of the enchanting flow of spring
Soon there will be surge and stream and gush and flow once again
As land wakes up hungry

But for now
There is no difference to be seen
The frozen shadows still lie blue on the silent snow
The cold wind still whips snow devils through ice engorged arroyos

An opulent moon rises like butter above a world of spun sugar
Suddenly, a white lynx, with eyes that mirror the moon,
Runs swift and silent across the empty, milky, moonlit snowfield . . .
A streaking shade of ghostly ground fog; a pale liquid whisper across the snow

In the dark of the pines at the other side of the meadow
She lashes herself with her tail and smiles
Footprints
The hard, unyielding snow has turned to dreams of softness
The adamant ice has inhaled a short quick breath of green

The thaw has begun to let down
And soon a thankful world
Will begin again to
Suckle
Spring


©Edwina Peterson Cross