April Is the Cruelest Month...

"Remember," said April, "the forsythia

that you remembered and drew for the teacher

whom you wanted to cheer up, 

who would not be cheered up."

"I remember," I said, "not to cling to a peevish mood."

"Remember," said April, "the fluffy baby chicken

who learned to snuggle into your hand or pocket..

You embroidered his likeness on a pocket later

and he flew at it scratching and biting,

trying to tear the pocket off your skirt.

For an encore he tried to kill his fluffy baby son."

"I remember," I said, "to choose female animals as pets."

"Remember," said April, "the barrels of family treasures

stored under the house on the sunny side of the hill.

Instead of leaving them at another relative's house

your parents tried to move them across the country

and lost things that had been kept for three hundred years."

"I remember," I said, "to avoid changes of address."

"Remember..." said April. On and on memory went.

How each year's spring stirs up hopes of Paradise

that fall and are dashed on the stones of earthly reality,

and each disappointment's a lesson, drawing the sting

of April's fooling from a life-beginner's mind...

"How all things sang of life while your husband was dying,

how summer never followed spring for him."

"I remember," I said: "in the midst of life 

we are in death." And I shed no tear

for I am old enough to have shed all my tears now.

One who has no more tears cannot live much longer

and spares no more time to regrets and recriminations.

"My work is done, then," said April, unfurling dogwood

and redbud and cherry blossoms, trees of pink snow,

the fabulous feral peach tree defying all the attempts

on its life and on mine. And my eyes drank and rejoiced.