Follows The Sun

dark in the morning
still light out at six pm
mondays are mondays

When I think about spring cleaning
I think about warm days in April throwing
all the doors and windows open
and sweeping the dust right
out over the threshold

but most years I find
that as soon as the light starts

to change I start diving in
and cleaning deeper Maybe it’s just
because I can see the dirt better

***

well the sun is back today
in a big way
man I was pretty frustrated
when I found out I only had half
an hour to be where I needed
to be not an hour and a half

but my bedroom only
gets sunshine in summer light
months and it’s hard to

be mad at that

Today I walked up a snow-covered hill
and didn’t break through the crust
of ice
this is a delight only venerable
snow affords

thank you
March

***

2014
the calendar worked out
so that February’s Fridays
were multiples of seven

which felt very neat
and orderly and a little
surreal

March not
to be out done
is also laying out
it’s Fridays through the seven
times table

by April we will
all remember

it right up to seven times four

Wednesday morning   there were two priests
on the corner by the bakery 

in robes like for mass
I suppose   I was confused

then I saw their little mobile 
can of ashes

and realized the significance
of my Cape Verdean student

telling me about Mardi Gras time
in the islands   two

festivals I knew of that I didn't realize
March contained

Walked around the block before eight o’clock this morning
it wasn’t that cold
a few birds were singing
and the way the light slanted down, it felt just like spring

so the iced over banks of old snow
felt incongruous

but they belong here
more light coming
more snow possible tonight
and for a few days starting on Tuesday

March won’t fit into your boxes
March has it both ways

This is an excellent time of year
for tiny landscapes

two-foot mountain ranges
full of delicate peaks
and crests of dirt-covered ice
flood planes crossed with
channel systems spanning
the foot of the drive way

deltas and all

There’s a certain kind of gray day
where you don’t even really see clouds in the sky
just endless pale grayness
that makes it feel as though the day lacks boundaries

oh, is it morning?
oh, is it afternoon?
oh, it is night.

This year, instead of deciding on what I want to try to modify in my life all at once and hoping I can stick it out for the whole 364, I am trying to make monthly resolutions. I have a lot more opportunities to get back on the wagon this way. Also, more opportunities to change wagons. Or repaint my wagon. Or whatever.

Which is good, because this winter I have fallen off every wagon I tried to get on. Situations in my work kept changing, and as I struggled to adapt, effects rippled out to the rest of my life.

And it’s been a cold, snowy winter.

I am committed to seasons. I love the variety of them, all the different types of days I get to experience. I appreciate the austere and intricate beauties of winter. But I am also a huge lover of growing things, and by February I begin to miss grass and moss and leaves on the trees a lot. And I miss the sunshine, obviously. I get worse and worse at going out after dark. I feel as though I have less time in my days, but of course I have the same 24 hours as ever. I can become grumpy and resentful about winter, and frustrated that spring takes so many months to come.

In the past I have been unfair to March. This morning I was thinking about my resolutions and what I want to do in this month, and it occurred to me that March really doesn’t get a lot of attention. I feel like I always want to skip over March, and I think western cannon sort of does too. So this year, I am going to try to pay a lot of attention to the particular character of March. I want to try to love it for exactly what it is.

This year, I will show March I care about it by writing it a poem for each of it’s days.

***
March 1st Poem

Today I bought pussy willow
branches at the market
They have had them
since February but
that seemed too soon
March is a good time
for soft grey buds

I went a
little wild
and bought daffodils
too