Tuesday Poem: "Spring Comes Early to the Fridge"

Spring Daffodils near the ruined Catholic Basilica 

(Copyright 2012 Andrew M. Bell)

Ice arcs through the air

like solid lightning.

The large bolts strike with a rumble

and clatter to rest

where they gleam with bravado

at the dispirited winter sun.

The small bolts explode

with a skittering hiss

and trickle down between the bricks,

prodigal drops returning to the watertable.

Cast out from its plastic host,

the ice bears grooved testimony to their symbiosis,

but this testimony concedes to the crafting thaw

a bevel smoother than a human hand could fashion.

Some ice lies clustered on the brick paving

like terra incognita wrought on a vellum map

by the feverish imagination of an Olde World explorer.

Some lies scattered among the purple and white alyssum

in imitation of a Tyrolean spring.

As a breeze releases

the olfactory history of myriad fridge dwellers,

a cloth rings over a wire tray

in a crude arpeggio which segues into

the basso profundo of the resurrection hum.

The cycle begins anew.

POET'S NOTE: Spring seems to have arrived in Christchurch and we are truly thankful. We have had a more than usually cold and wet winter and the daffodils blooming and sunlit blue skies fill our hearts with joy and optimism. The days are getting warmer and lighter and you gotta love that!

The poet wishes to acknowledge The Western Review (Australia) in whose pages this poem first appeared.