March Snow

“March comes with a roar.

He rattles your windows and scratches at your door.

He turns snow to mud, then tromps across your floor.”

These lines come from the picture book, In Like a Lion, Out Like A Lamb by Marion Dane Bauer.  It perfectly captures the variable nature of  March weather.  I was hoping to escape spring snow this year. This year, I desperately need spring to come early.  I am through with gray, cold, and drudge.  One more morning, using an ice scraper is going to put me over the edge.  No more mittens or gloves, scarfs, or hats.  March needs to get its act together and bring on the warmth, the sun, the flowers, the bees, and the songbirds!

And so… of course, I woke up yesterday morning to freezing rain, which quickly became snow.  It came down heavy and wet.  It stayed all day long.  The flakes formed on the first crocuses, on the about-to-bud trees, on the wings of birds huddled under the trees.  The wind whipped up freezing cold and fierce.  I think it thought it was still January.  I went to my closet and pulled out my heaviest coat and my  double-thick mittens, and my Nordic woolen hat. I pulled on my snow boots and headed outside to brave this March snow – I hope it’s the last one.  I decided to embrace the lion and make its path of frozen snow and wicked wind  into art.

March Snow

Flakes fall and fall
On roads, lawns, meadows,
And tall stands of trees.
Black birds crouch
Beneath the pines,
The mourning doves meditate,
Puffed-up and quiet
On bare, gray branches.
Snow continues – all day long
Straight and steady from the sky,
Collecting on every single surface.
A winter wind asserts itself
And whips around and around,
Stinging my cheeks and fingers,
Winter does not want to let go.

But I need winter to up and leave.
I need pink and yellow petals,
I need blue sky and white clouds,
I need the golden warmth
Of the springtime sun.
I desperately need to see
The fresh face of Persephone:
Grass beneath my feet,
Daffodils swaying
In the soft, warm breeze,
The fragrant smell of
Green and growing,
The songs of the chickadees,
The squawks of the jays.
All the world welcoming spring.