My mother’s plum tree,
how many birds have perched here,
releasing petals?

Testimonial,
above speech and below song,
this spring moss takes flight.

Withheld salvation,
we’re not meant for this heartbreak,
this separation.

The sun on their backs,
trout lilies and violas,
I live for these days.

Trees—rising, falling,
lily colonies below,
ancestors, not ghosts.

The dreaming inside—
I wish I knew the dreamer,
she’s always hopeful.

April forest floor,
trout lily and May apple
meet the cloaked bloodroot.

Neil Young’s flying geese—
I know that melancholy,
missing what is home.

At the estate sale,
hyacinth blooming out front,
April’s first bright day.

Daffodills for sale
off of Huron River Drive,
two dollars a bunch.

Hundreds of teasels,
standing in their dormant state,
just waiting to turn.

Maybe crows called here,
coyotes might have passed by—
fresh pinecone in spring.

One after the next,
Bloodroot springs up on this slope,
blue jays call and call.

A Red Admiral
finds light on the trail with us,
woods full of birdsong.

Twin century trees,
one falls before the other,
lies like a shadow.

Two woodpecker pairs
tapping in the still forest,
the only sound heard.

Green moss wreaths each tree,
river flows with melted snow,
spring’s foot in the door.

Like the Milky Way,
like a curled listening ear,
this blue turkey tail.

The beaver sculpture
left beside the fallen tree
at the river’s edge.

The geraniums,
the plots of land and gardens—
only poems left.