Category: Spring Songs

I stand in the deep vegetation at the creek’s edge
stunned by the countless shades of green
and by the tangled lushness of it all.
A mere six weeks ago, I was hunting
for the first wild flower, hoping one had poked up
through the still brown and matted grass.
And look now, what the spring has wrought
in what feels like a blink of my awestruck eyes.
God, I love May! How could You write Your Yes
more clearly? How could one see this
and doubt Your being!

Every time I wrote the date today, Mom,
I thought of you and felt a smile that tasted
like warmed honey move across my face.
It was a century and two years ago,
probably on a day as lovely as this one,
that you were born, gifting the world
with a strength and grace all your own.
Now, as I note this anniversary, my heart
swells with gratitude and love for you.
How I feel your arms surrounding me!
How I know, more deeply with every
passing day, how truly beautiful you were!
How indebted and grateful I am for all the gifts
you so generously gave to me, and to all
whose lives you touched with you gentleness
and rare courage. Happy Birthday, Marion May.
I love you, and always will.

We little humans get our ideas,
make our plans, and then say—
when unseen variables come
into play sending things askew—
“The devil is in the details.”

Then there’s the cosmos,
with its vast panorama
of nebulae and star-spangled
galaxies, one of which we
live in, on a tiny speck circling
one of its thousands of stars,
where life thrives—imagine
that!—and where beauty
finds its way down to the
tiniest of details, and
everything sings the perfection
of the omnipresent Yes.

Beneath it all, beneath her exuberance
and delicious abandon, beneath
her inexhaustible range of hues,
her burgeoning greens, her endless
moods and forms, what I love most
about May is the tender sweetness
of her endless, bountiful gifts.

Regardless of the world’s confusion,
its violence and evil and pain,
on this clear May morning lilacs blossom
and swallowtails, newly emerged
from their dark cocoons, flit in dizzy joy
to sip the nectar.

Here is your reassurance, dear child.
Here is proof of life’s renewal.
Here is proof of grace.

It was yesterday, late in the afternoon.
All day, every fifteen-twenty minutes,
the mother had flown in to feed them.
They chirped loud chirps: Me first!
No! Me! Me next! Don’t forget me!
And then they napped, transforming
their meals into feather and muscle.

Just the day before, I caught one of them
standing on a twig at the nest’s edge,
between naps, bold and fearless as could be.
Today, I didn’t get a chance to see them
until afternoon. With camera in hand
I walked softly through light rain.
They were silent. Must be napping.

But no! They were gone!
I just stood there in the rain, staring,
waiting for my eyes to convince me
of what was plainly the fact. The nest
was empty. They were gone.
So, the chapter closes; the stories go on.
I’ll remember the one about baby robins.

Oh, fragrant little beauty,
so precious and dear,
your tiny bells whisper
of our grandmothers’ gardens
and of May bouquets in miniature vases
filling our rooms with your sweet perfume.

Sweetheart of the Mother herself,
you are all that is pure and pleasing,
all that is tenderness and joy.
Every spring may you ring your sweet bells
until there are springs no more.

It doesn’t matter that you grow in a tangle of weeds
or that you’re hidden in some corner where few ever pass.
You’re still exactly where you were destined to be,
where you were meant to unfurl your colors,
where you were needed to sing your song.

The sunbeams will still find you, the stars
will light your nights. Soft rains will come
to quench your thirst and refresh you.
And when you least expect them, friends
will appear who see your strength and beauty.

Through your petals and leaves and stems, life
extends its blessings to the world.
So blossom and dance, little child of the Yes,
and hear the wind whisper how you matter
and are precisely where you are needed to be.

Every day comes with its own gifts, of course.
But some, I’ve found, come wrapped in disguise,
making you hunt for the prize. Sometimes
you can go for months, even years,
before you discover what the gift was.

But some days unfold with unblemished perfection
that sings through the hours from dawn into night,
every one of them spilling over with beauty.
And when they close, they float into your heart,
just to remind you that perfection is possible,
and that you lived in its midst one day in spring.

In celebration of their 10th day of life.

Oh, Great Yes, whose promptings
led these little ones to chirp this morning
from their safe, if crowded, nest,
singing their notes into the huge, unknown world,
please protect them. Keep them safe
from prowling beasts and teach them
how to shelter from the rains. Help them,
with their just-opened eyes, to see
that the world is a welcoming place,
and strengthen them with each passing hour
until they can spread their wings and fly.
Comfort their parents, who even now,
are sending anxious cries from nearby branches,
and help them bring juicy worms until
the babies learn to find them on their own.
One more thing. Accept my thanks
for letting me watch this miracle unfold
and for placing these almost-smiling fledglings
at my door. In the name of Love, which flows
unendingly from Your heart, Thank You!
And Amen.