April 2019
Note: It has been a dark spring this year in Southern California where the weather has been gloomy, wet, and cold by our semi-desert standards. But, of course “Dark Spring” is not about weather.
Dark Spring
I think it hard to hold onto belief
that spring’s eternal glory will rebound
again on days so dark and filled with grief
the sky hangs down. I hear the keening sound
of foghorns far from shore where warning words
are useless, with no one to hear the soft
rejoinder to beware. Even seabirds
don’t appear, find a distant home aloft.
Some happiness mistakes a cry for song.
So too, some misery’s notes are crossed
with joy, and life and death belong
to the same mad throng. All that is lost
in winter each spring returns to claim.
That I might fail to notice is my shame.
from Gravity: New & Selected Poems, Tebot Bach 2018
Dark Spring
I think it hard to hold onto belief
that spring’s eternal glory will rebound
again on days so dark and filled with grief
the sky hangs down. I hear the keening sound
of foghorns far from shore where warning words
are useless, with no one to hear the soft
rejoinder to beware. Even seabirds
don’t appear, find a distant home aloft.
Some happiness mistakes a cry for song.
So too, some misery’s notes are crossed
with joy, and life and death belong
to the same mad throng. All that is lost
in winter each spring returns to claim.
That I might fail to notice is my shame.
from Gravity: New & Selected Poems, Tebot Bach 2018
© 2019 Donna Hilbert
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