My heart has been so full of the sweet beauty of the spring lately – all the flowers and sweet smells, and the still cool milky nights under the waxing moon, with the first little fireflies winking in the dark places under the oak trees, looking bright but lonely in the big night.

O sweet garlanded spring, with your showers and your flowers! When the wind sweeps across the fresh green grass like a song played high up in every bright, new leaf, it never fails to unlock my heart.

It happens so fast, I feel it so strongly every year when the quiet brown of the winter one day is flushed in such a whirl of gentle colors and green, with that strong, bright force that reaches skyward, tender but always hopeful, striving towards the golden sun and sweet rain, all crowded with music and bird song and sweet tempting fragrance. Even when I’ve lost hope, it still whispers to me, “Awake!”

I think what I love best about spring is how some great and magic moment is always right around the corner, like the firefly that was tangled in Clo’s hair, lighting up her whole face with green light, or when I trudged out early one morning, so tired from working in the garden the day before, with all my chores ahead of me, and the smell of the blooming grapevines filled my whole soul with beauty in those first few moments of that day.

Spring must be savored and smelled and loved – how many more times in my life will I have to walk among the scarlet poppies, or smell the roses?