April snow -

the garden’s carpeted with 

sugared violets.

Tank-ta-tank-tank-tank-tank

The Hairy Woodpecker pounds the 

domed metal yard light housing 

like a concert pianist 

hunched over his Steinway grand.

She spreads mayo on dark rye

he nibbles a yellow pear

brainstorming, giggling 

siblings at the kitchen counter.

Hard paddling mallard 

leaves a crooked ice-breaker trail

across the white slushed pasture puddle.

Roadside hawthorne 

buds spilling crumpled leaves

chartreuse and alizarin

Late planted bulbs battle up

Through record bitter spring

First bloom, barely above ground -

Must be a dwarffodil.

A bulbous cobalt bottle 

heavy with white wax dribbles 

holds a corniced candle stub 

with cold black wick.

All over the yard

bright threads of spring grass 

poke up out of lightly settled snow.

The air smelled like rain at seven.

At nine I shake my umbrella up and down -

damp snow slooooshes off the nylon,

flomping onto the pale grass all around me.

Shoji paper sky -

muted sun circumferenced by 

coronal rainbow.

Lemon yellow and rust striped bumblebee 

running pick-up and delivery 

service in the violet colony.

Thing in the road - 

chipmunk blurring to safety.

Pour yellow beaten eggs 

and straight-from-the-garden chives

into hot black cast iron glistening

with fragrant olive oil.

Square jar of pale green glass,

one bottom corner thicker as though 

still forming from the molten flow.

Magpie sitting on a weathered gray split rail fence 

like a cowboy at the rodeo in black jeans

dress-up boots and a clean white shirt

Dew diamonds glittering among green slivers of spring grass.

Two pounds of butter in a white paper roll

We shave off bits and eat them plain

Tastes pretty much the same 

Battered yellow newspaper box across the faded yellow highway centerline.

Among rusty ponderosa needles and 

delicate blades of new grass

a single yellow bell 

Rolling spring wheat fields

colored eight-crayons-in-a-box green

A tiny glass medicine bottle 

holds eight deep hued violets

air bubbles gathered along their 

curved underwater stems