BJZ Poems and Musings

Those of us in the more northern latitudes do endure a winter that can seem long with a March and even early April that are bipolar when it comes to weather, but then…spring. Like a time-lapse photograph, we see day by day, the flora leafing out, blooms arising, temperatures slowly climbing. It is one of my favorite times of year – this greening. So, I offer two poems written in and about spring. One from about 9 years ago that reflects on the resilience of Crocuses in early April. And the other, a new poem about what I have observed over the past month looking out our back windows – called The Greening.

Crocuses

Out behind the house
Where I throw the woodstove ashes
I sat on the sun-warmed rock
Tear stains dried, smeared with dirt,

Yet I could sad-smile. The crocuses are up!
Forced their pretty cone-heads
Through numbing cold earth
Ignoring snow, savoring sleet,
Petals purple, lavender, white,
Solid and striped,
Stamens starry orange,
About to be engulfed by night

Next morning, still in mourning
April’s Fool, in the cold hard rain;
I needed them so; raincoat on,
The rock was cold, yet there they were,
Stoic, splendid, tightly wrapped,
Spears of color in a world of gray;
I don’t know how long I sat,
But surely as this world goes ‘round,
They have saved me from this cold, wet ground

Brian J. Zink 2017

The Greening

each spring it is as if
Impressionists and friends
sneak into our woods
clamber down, into the ravine
then slither up the trees
with their brushes, palettes, paints
to dabble in all the shades of green

first Seurat and his tiny dots
until that becomes pointless
then Cézanne with thicker dollops
one morning, Monet, new hues and shapes
next Gaugin’s symbolic, sensual tones
finally, Van Gogh’s thick tortured swaths
luminescent in that crazy collage
now complete

the neighbors’ homes across the ravine
obscured in this marvelous medley of greens
and me, satisfied patron, who pays not one franc
for this springtime plein-air masterpiece

Brian J. Zink 2026 Copyright rules apply