The Dogwood Never Fails

Now Faith and Hope and Charity— Upon these three men all agree None greater can in heart reside. More fickle, though, are veins of wood, And tenderest April blossoms could (No lack of good intent besides) Be withered by an ill-timed frost Or by nor’easter be accost’d. The life of blossoms is not sure! The

Tulip People

Tulip people aren’t Crocus people. They don’t tweet out    slapdash signals of spring    at February’s first foray into the 50s. Tulip people are distinct from the Daffodil crowd— apart and unmoved, apparently unheralded    by spring’s delirious drum majors    and clamorous countryside. Tulip people aren’t Hyacinth hipsters     or Snowdrop snobs, nor

Route 31, 4:37 A.M.

On a Tuesday
at 4:37 A.M…

Magnolia Buds

Hang on, Magnolia buds, My dears! Hang on, Magnolia buds! Bear with this ill-timed Arctic air Withstand this undue frost. Nor let us come April into And fail to find thee there. March 28, 2022

April 9

There are three things which I do not believe— four that I will never understand: The ninny who announces that she doesn’t like bacon, the philistine who posits improvements of baseball, the charlatan who espouses a god in his own image, and the ogre who identifies his favorite season without stating first and foremost, unequivocally,

The Last Bath

Will we know it when it happens? And (if so) how will we know? Will we know that we know? Will we be able to recognize it? . Will the moment herald itself   with the shout of an archangel? Or will we anticipate its coy arrival with   a kind of parental prescience? .

The Maples of Broad Street

The maples of Broad Street
have ceased to be tame,
The maples of Broad Street
are shaking their manes

Cacophony

It must have been

an evening in early August

when ‘cacophony’ was coined.

What other moment

could have minted

such an awesome articulation:

the world’s most perfect word?

Chicory

Ode to the summer roadside’s unassuming garland

Tomato Plants in Late June

Tomato plants in late June

don’t smell like anything

except

tomato plants in late June.

Singular unto themselves

their redolence subsists…