musée mia burrus

Spring Songs

 
 Comes spring 
 and the gibbous moon, 
 draws washtub-bass
 plunks and plonks
 from the night frogs
 singing in the inky pond.
 The green hills 
 are gray as shadow,
 the shadows black
 as void.
 The frogs sing
 in their way;
 the moon shines
 in its way;
 to themselves
 to each other.
  
 By day you can see
 the lay of the land
 before all manner 
 of things spring
 up and make you 
 lose your way
 among the flowers.
 Birds loop unhindered
 among bare branches
 racing to build nests
 with the fines that
 have melted out 
 of the snow, 
 and then wait
 for leaves to open
 a cooling canopy 
 over their heads. 
  
 By day other frogs whine 
 and whine like clotheslines,
 hours at a time
 till then they stop-
 and you wonder
 Why? though you
 and your woefully
 human hearing
 had been secretly wishing
 they’d just shut up
 for a while, so 
 you could better hear 
 the distant birds sing
 ‘exquisite’ ‘exquisite’.
 O spring songs of love and praise!