Dave Bonta's five short stanzas capture a spring that is late and struggling. Each one is a small snapshot from the woods: butterflies walking instead of flying, fern tips still curled tight, a gnat hanging on to a flower in the wind, caterpillars and leaf-bits crowding a pond. The cold shows up in nearly every scene, and the creatures seem to be making do, moving slowly or holding on.
The speaker mostly watches quietly, and the tone is patient and attentive rather than gloomy. There's a sense of sympathy for these small, fragile things. The last stanza shifts the mood. The speaker bends down to look closely at an oak apple gall, and the phrase "such a fresh green globe" sounds like real delight. After all the clenched and shivering details, this bright, round shape suggests that life is still arriving, even if slowly. The poem ends on quiet reassurance.