Springtime
Is a soggy shoebox for silkworms
Force-fed mulberry leaves
By tenacious fingers.
It is
A fisherman and his market
Wet-footed and wilting
Under heavy scales of fresh-killed silver.
Is
A goose-bumped leg
Unbothered, grassy-toed, damp to the knee
And gleeful in its romping.
Is
A cotton sundress
Somebody's throwaway
In need of a stitch it will never get.
Is
Acrid smoke
Shrouding first breaths of infants born to missing mothers
Life and death entwine.
Springtime
Is a barren place at a dimly-lit table
And the uninhabited womb beside it.
