April is the Cruelest Month....

April is the cruelest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.
                       T.S. Eliot, "The Wasteland"


Spring here, so heart breakingly green.
...the tiny pink flowers in the woods, and trillium.
I pick fresh nettles to have them for lunch
they give me strength for more garden work.
The squall comes in at 5, sending me back inside
by the fire.

10 years ago, we thought it should be warm,
My Mom and I,
leaving on the train for the east,
 but no.
The plains were mud and sleet, 
The Mississippi flooding our bridge
The snow
had barely melted in New York.

Eliot wrote of wars, the irony of new life upon the dull
land..
And I know, even in the heart hopes are too sharply bright
for the eyes, like wet spring green grass against the shifting sky

April is the cruelest month, only because of crocuses and cherry trees
Do they they know of their audaciousness?
I think not, as the white blossoms litter the muddy road
And we watch the rain for isotopes
We cannot see.