1: Spring
The Japanese maple stretches
its new, maroon leaves
above the golden spirea—
and is witness to the lavish
palette of spring, where robins
hunt.
2: Turf
Something is bothering me
but I can't gather
what it is. Listless, at odds,
I approach the kitchen window
only to find two deer grazing
near the roses.
3: Nigiri
Only a few, simple things
have been more surprising
than this: a small filet
of blood-red tuna resting
on a bed of sweetened rice.
4: Temptation
Cruel April, first warm, lustrous,
and heartily flowered; now
cool again with a chilling wind
and still lustrous: aureate dusk—
song—my cat enchanted by his prey.
5: Light
Tall, slender trunks of the
stately ponderosa increasingly
illuminate in the late April
light. The oaks wear their
new leaves like young girls.
6: Dogwood in an Industrial Park
The sky hindered with ice crystals.
A cottonwood struggling to leaf.
A warm day with a cold wind—April;
poppies blooming in the sidewalk
cracks where hefty workmen sit
at lunch.
7: Women in Spring
A sky weakened with cirrus, oak leaves
gorging on light. A group of cyclists
pausing for water; two blondes in jackets
waiting patiently on patient horses
where a mail truck starts slowly down
a narrow dirt road.
8: Girls
The afternoon spent watching some girls
rally a ball over a net, hoping to avoid
defeat. It's a tough thing to consider.
One day I want to live forever
and the next day I don't.
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