April 01 2007, 09:09 PM Better To Rive The Sky With

At long last, we have Spring. I speak here not of the birds, who have returned with abundant force to fill the air with tweet and twirp and buzz the porch in a mad chase of something I cannot see. Nor do I mean the greening that is starting, everywhere: the shocking emerald of fresh leaflets on the maple, or the tidy marching rows of bulbs burst upwards in the neighbor's lawns (mine, too, but less tidy). Walking on earth these days is mucky as the dirt wakes up to stretch, and old leaves need to be raked from the lavender patch, but: no. It is Spring, for we have thunderstorms.

In the previous home, these were something of a sad occasion: the only good windows faced east, and at low angle, and the viewing was poor. Here, though, I can light a candle to climb the stairs (and then again) up to the battlements of the third floor to take sentry at the windows. Up there the whole sky is spread out, grey and back, until those moments when white traces spindly fingers, hands. It is a treasure and a joy, and I want to make the windows bigger. Not this year, nor next, but someday. When the storms pass, I can watch them leave their parting shots from the porch, in tenuous shelter. The air is cool and sweet behind them.

As usual, the plants are due an indignity. Later this week, we are expected to get snow; I am curious to see how the chives handle that. I am hoping that the local apple trees have so far been shy this year, and have not yet set bloom, but I do not know. Regardless, it remains Spring. We sometimes get snow in Spring around here, is all. So it goes.

Happy Birthday, Harry.