April 2022
Bio Note: I live on a farm along the Susquehanna River, just before that river crosses the border into Pennsylvania for the first time. There I and my husband have raised Morgan horses since the 1970's. My three full-length books of poetry are Crave (from NYQ Books); Appetite for the Divine (Ashland Poetry Press); and Remorseless Loyalty (also from Ashland Poetry Press).
Author's Note: One of those moments when a child first realizes their own aliveness
New
You're nine, walking
to school in April air so new
your chest aches:
the maples unwrap translucent
ears, tuning them towards you;
tulips in the yards spread
their petal lips in expectant smiles
as you pass while redwings
whistle the high note
of your heart; the sun streams directly
into your dreams, your every prayer
prepares itself to be answered
Originally published in Remorseless Loyalty (Ashland Poetry Press, 2006).
Author's Note: I can remember that walk and writing this poem, though it was many springs ago and now the younger of my two children is himself very nearly 41. Springtime can sometimes still momentarily cause that sensation of renewability.
Spring at 41
I walked the woods early today. Sunlight advanced before me across the hill's crest as if the light and warmth were mesh, a solar seine delicately, deliberately opening out in the morning's first cast. Birdsong and frog trill were a pulse, a felt sound in that spring air. Bluets, violets, strawblossoms, and spring beauties crowded my path in such profusion I could imagine they welcomed me much as I welcomed them. My own arms swung at my sides, in the line of sight, my skin crimped yet with the imprint of the bedsheets, wrinkled like a baby's cheek from the crib. This was a kind of grace to behold and for the moment I felt renewable as the morning.
Originally published in Remorseless Loyalty (Ashland Poetry Press, 2006).
©2022 Christine Gelineau
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