For a day or two
a warm green taste escapes the diesel fumes,
the heavy air hangs low &
pulls us close
enough to hear electric whispers on
the wind
announce the verdant birth of Spring…

then routine returns to smother it all
in bullshit:
birdsong
becomes just more white noise we all ignore.

Spring soon ends & then, somehow languorous
yet sudden,
sullen evening light of summer
begins again another doomed attempt
at bringing colour into every hour
of each dilating day.

Autumn begins: I hear
violins, a sigh that heaves from
everything,
as the light takes on a melancholy
tinge: austere admixture
of fading green & deep orange
as the once-whispering wind
devours the trees.

Now snow falls like dove feathers
laying quiet & still until dawn’s frail purity
breaks beneath our feet,
the mixed-up air already containing
greater darkness, low hanging Sun;
the light still bright but bleached out &
luminescent,
clouds lingering white phosphorus,
as if
the winter sky is a war crime above us.

Every year becomes this:
the flower’s imperceptible blooming,
slowly turning
towards decay;

slow to remember & quick to forget
how the season’s elision
fucks with our head(s).