“Spring 2”

“He felt the earth truly awakening after its frozen Midwestern hibernation. Soft thawed earth in the gardens. Lawns that had been rock hard, now mushy and moist. Permanent canopies of pale gray cloud were now rent to reveal irregular but welcome patches of butterfly-blue sky. It was as if a long siege against the fortress of an evil prince had finally yielded success—the walls were penetrated and the light could pore in where only gray dimness had been. Asphalt roads glistened with a wet sheen reflecting the sunshine. Mica and other glittery minerals in the schoolyard gravel shone in dazzle as they fell through his fingers. More than all this was a vast primeval embrace that nature offered the world on this spring day. Like a fine and comely young woman emerging from a sea swim, glistening, the sun highlighting the glories of her form, hair shaken back, water drops beaded on her tanned flesh, a knowing smile of self-appreciation on her lips and in her dark eyes, Nature seemed this day to stretch her open arms towards him and invite him into the innermost spaces of her beauty. For she was all cleansed, all youthful, all glorious, and all charming; she had awakened from a long sleep and stepped out of her refreshing bath and offered herself to him to be quaffed in a deep gulp for the perfect intoxication of his soul.”