The End is Near!

 Today I drove to Lowville to pick up some groceries (and seeds to plant with Lincoln!).  The sun has shone brilliantly all day, and while we were out and about the reading on the van's thermometer increased by 12 degrees, topping off at 43*.  This is exciting, folks, because though I know that winter will hang on until the end of April... or longer...it means that the end is coming soon.  It's so good to have hopeful days.  The fields we drove past also reminded me of a poem I wrote a couple of years ago:

"The First of March"

Under dazzling afternoon sun

I admired fields of old snow

blanketing

the network of little rivers

eroding the winter--

dying glaciers in microcosm--

tracing across the hillsides

like stretchmarks shimmering down

the slope of a pregnant woman's belly

preparing her for promised new life.

                                               -Lydia

                                   March 1, 2011