Purple croci bloom
and before we know it
spring marches into Bellingham.
Tree removers, red-shirted showmen,
ignite saws that roar, bite and spit
a giant Evergreen to the ground.
The wind scrabbles fresh cedar dust
and our newborn air smells alive.
Neighbors gather outside to flirt like street kids.
A mother parades by on a girl’s bike,
her son beside her
on a wobbling three-wheeler.
His younger sister stays behind,
her budding fingers shaping
cedar dust into butterflies.
My daughter pumps a basketball,
plays one-on-one with her older brother.
I take a walk in the green and muddy woods.
Soon I’ll pick baskets of fleshy plums.
I’ll sweeten the sour skins
and boil their purple juices.
For now, between the cricket’s jump and chirp
and the crow’s caw at dawn,
I wake at 3 a.m.to the beauty
of sleeplessness, the flash
and fall of meteorites,
their curved descent,
thankful for silence, sacred
and content, these offerings,
seasonal pangs, ripening.
By Betty Scott