It’s The First Day of Spring
And She is Blue.
On the first day of spring in the year
A virus dug at the soft bits of
Our lives like a bike chain slipping
From cog to flesh, Ellen said No.
The air was warm that day, the snow
In her yard, once a cloud of milk,
Had shrunken to an isolated patch –
Like an unpopular kid in a playground.
Are you well?
She was standing on the walkway she’d built
One summer with Dan, while the baby
Whose babies no longer go to school
Kicked naked on her blanket in the shade.
Back then, Dan found saffron in a crocus
Flower and smeared the yellow on his teeth
For neighbors, who turned their faces into doors.
They said Boo! and grinned. The baby squealed.
Studying object permanence.
Actually, Ellen told the woman in a print dress
Too light, really, for the day they’d been given,
I have been blue. She caught her breath, bracing
For the empty gaze, the dart away. The woman stayed.