O April, this day, dogwood wash-white  
tossed sheet in the sky

pear bee-pearled
among the lacy lichen

pink trumpets of honeysuckle tangled
in the hair of a child pumping up a swing 
 
maples sap-upping,
leaves sunshine sponges for watery blue sky

lupines like long muzzles
firing on beachy fronts

poppies cupped like foxholes
to catch the mortar rounds of light

lilac white and purple
cones of explosive enthrallment

and inside the pollen bed
a fetal blossom poised to launch

swayed so still the mere fumbling fondle 
of a loving bee rings to root

like a bell tolling the conclusion
of winter’s war----

O the wincing, the wavering, the tempting
O the swooning and fainting, the captive crying to endure

O April, I thy nose-weary 
lung-laden harvester of smells

on bended knees, hands moss-mingled
manured, mulched, hydrangea haunted

O April, O month of grace,
do you I praise

I learned from a drenched dairy field 
that to walk sideways with a lurch 

and a head-bob meant I could go forward, 
traction-less boots more like flippers,

that to walk required a lunge sideways 
with my body tilted as if to make a face plant.

Afield this spring, my shoulders tip, dip. 
and head drops. Humbled, I proceed.