I shouldn’t hate March, but I do.
This trickster of months promises spring,
then takes it away, dumping another foot
of thick snow, like clumps of brown sugar,
onto overburdened branches.
I shouldn’t hate March,
except two days after winter, at last, retreated
while spring, newly born, hung back,
she died.
The weak winter sun was her last
The sky, a slab of concrete,
the trees, skeletal, ashen
the world colorlesss…
She died when March’s dull eyes
had not yet found their shine.
I do hate March, I do
for pulling the sun close,
so it could thaw the frozen ground,
but not until after she sighed her last breath,
not until then!
She died, cheated of the first Magnolia blooms
cheated, as the newly warm days
painted the dormant grass green
and coaxed bright confetti, from our tiny apple trees.
Each crocus, each daffodil, each verdant bud
that reached for life as she faded from it—
were a mockery.
Winter’s last month branded everything she lost
into my soul. Its final days of deprivation
are situated too close to abundance.
I do hate March, I do