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Thursday, March 20, 2014

Pippa's Song, Or, Welcome to Spring

"The year's at the spring and day's at the morn;
Morning's at seven; The hillside's dew-pearled;
The lark's on the wing; The snail's on the thorn:
God's in His heaven - All's right with the world."
(From Robert Browning's 'Pippa Passes')

I went out looking for signs of a change in the seasons on this first day of Spring and found none until I walked into Walmart and saw a display of plants for sale - even some big pots of single tomato plants already a foot and half tall. They weren't out where the plants usually are in the spring - it's still too cold, even though we are having a very welcome warm day today. (60+ degrees)


I thought if I raked the leaf cover off the daffodils I would find them looking something like this picture which was taken last March 28. Nope. Not a sign of them.


Remember that mild winter two years ago? Here are those same daffodils almost blooming on St. Patrick's Day that year.


March 16, 2012 and the willows were already greening - always one of my harbingers of spring. No green on the willows to be found yet.


Mama & Papa goose are back on the pond and though Mama isn't on the nest yet and we're still a month or so away from having baby goslings, just having the parents present is reason enough to hope.



The weather here is supposed to be nice for one more day before turning cold again for the coming week. I haven't begun packing yet, but sometime in the next couple of weeks we're going to begin chasing spring with a trip to the Gulf Coast. Surely there will be dogwoods and redbuds in bloom in Arkansas or Tennessee and azaleas and rhododendrons in Alabama and Florida? By the time we return the daffodils will be blooming here, won't they?

"No winter lasts forever; no spring skips its turn." (Hal Borland)





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