Before the Branches

Before the branches
burst to bloom
the canopy breaks
in song,

whistled melody
of Meadowlark, 
raucous duet
of Carolina Wren. 

Who’s to say it isn’t music
that pulls sap up?
That thickens buds,
coaxes samara free,

seeds that tremble and fall
like treble to bass,
a song, twirling repetition,
a refrain, circling veins—

sky to ground,
ground to worm,
worm to throat,
throat to song,
song to sugar,
rising. 

This beautiful photo was taken by Ronald Lanham, whom I met while swimming laps at the YMCA, which is another way of saying that you should always talk to strangers!

The Prompt

Kentucky has spun, quite suddenly, from a most unsouthern winter to what feels like spring. The sky is blue, the ground is muddy, and the air is thick with birdsong. I like the idea that birdsong is what makes spring happen. That the birds draw the warmth of the sun toward us with the power of their music, like they are sirens and our sun the hapless voyager. Maybe I’ll choose to believe this for a day or two. People have certainly believed more ridiculous—and more harmful—things.

If you would like a prompt to play with today, then I offer you a single word from my own poem: seeds. Or seed in the singular, if you prefer.

Notice what your very first associations or memories are when you read that word. Do you remember that you need to order seeds for your garden? Do you recall the chia seed you flossed free from your teeth this morning? Do you think of sunflowers or pumpkins or your fingers pressing into cool, black soil? Or maybe you think of the book of Genesis—of Onan and all that seed spilled on the ground? (What a dirty religious mind you have!)

Are there visible seeds in your yard at this time of year? If so, can you hold one in your hand? What color is it, and what does it feel like against your skin? If you can’t find any seeds right now, imagine where they might be hiding. How many of them do you suppose there are, tucked beneath a blanket of soil? If they were to all sprout at once, what might that be like?

What in your life feels like a seed, waiting for water or warmth or light? What in your life do you hope is a seed? What does you hope isn’t?

Are there metaphorical seeds that you are trying to plant in your family or your community or the wider world? What makes that work hard? What makes it beautiful? What keeps you from giving up? What is the warmth or water or light that you most hope to offer your little plot of soil?

In the weeks to come, news will continue to break (our hearts). Some things that you want to have happen won’t, and some things you don’t want to have happen will. And also, birds will sing. Sap will rise. Invisible seeds will press their way up through the rich black rot of lives past and break open, tilting tiny green chins to the sun. And I will tip my little head toward yours and send you poems, and maybe you will tip your head my way with a poem of your own. This world is terrible. This world is gorgeous. Without fail, it takes my breath away—and hands it back again. I’m so glad that, in some small way, we’re doing this together.

If you’d like a bigger bit of togetherness, please share a poem of your own in the comments thread! Or if you want to go even more togethery than that, mark your calendars for March 15 at 12:00 PDT/3:00 EDT. LeeAnn Pickrell and I will be hosting what we hope will be the first of many open mic gatherings for Substack poets and readers. We’ll kick off with short readings by LeeAnn, me, Margaret Ann Silver, Fotini Masika, Nelly Bryce, and E R Skulmoski, and then we’ll open the mic. If you would like to read a poem of your own, please bring one along! We will wrap up by 1:30 PDT/4:30 EDT.

I’ll send out a Zoom registration link for paid subscribers some time this week. Free subscribers, you are absolutely invited, too—please come! I just don’t want to plaster the zoom info all over the interwebs. Send me an email or DM, and I’ll be happy to share it with you. I hope I’ll get to see many of you there!