The snow is gone, the sun is out, and green things are poking up through the dirt. Today I started cleaning up the old weeds and overgrowth that I left at the end of last summer, and I can see tiny green shoots just starting on the lavender that I forgot to cut back in the fall. The ground smells ground-y, and the birds are chirping. If you are looking for metaphor, look no farther than out the front door.
So, in the spirit of new beginnings, I am making some resolutions. Here they are. Hold me to them, please.
- Get all the flowerbeds cleared out by the end of this week. I'm on spring break, and the weather is supposed to be nice, so I have no excuses.
- Cut back the ivy and put in the waterfall/pond I've been talking about for three years.
- Get the ground tilled and ready for a big kitchen garden.
- Plant everything in good time.
- Keep up with everything all summer.
- Take time every day to sit and contemplate the flowers.
I am counting on you to not let me be a horticultural slacker, now. In reward, I'll post lots of pictures, and you can have as many zucchini as you can carry.
I'm so happy, I can hardly sit still. Here's a spring poem. Read it, then go outside and get some fresh air.
"Spring is like a perhaps hand"
by e.e. cummings
Spring is like a perhaps
hand
(which comes carefully
out of Nowhere)arranging
a window,into which
people look(while
people stare
arranging and changing
placing
carefully there a strange
thing and a known thing
here)and
changing everything
carefully
spring is like a perhaps
Hand in a window
(carefully to
and fro moving New and
Old things,while
people stare carefully
moving a perhaps
fraction of flower here
placing
an inch of air there)and
without breaking
anything.