It is fine that Emily Dickinson believed
that hope is the thing with feathers.
I choose the broken branches that fell
during the winter ice storm in January
and whose buds opened one April afternoon.
This morning begins silently with little light –
like a river at its mountain source,
just a pool of water flowing downhill –
gathering its kind in increasing potential energy.
A raindrop, seed, a newborn in spring.
The title of this poem is an aphorism by William Stafford. more info
Again I watch the sun rise east
climbing over me, stationary in my home,
and setting, as always, to the west.
If at the North or South Poles,
that’s not so. No East. No West.
Spring came early this year – a day
early astronomically speaking, but weeks earlier relatively,
based on my garden’s buds and shoots.
Perhaps not North of me and not
the Southern Hemisphere, where spring is autumn.
It’s a month of Saturdays in retirement.
Or perhaps every day is now Wednesday,
since weekend days still seem somehow special
hanging off my calendar in another color.
Are there still 24 hours each day?