A new brightness filters
Through the daylight hours
As sunshine stronger now
Beckons the first frail
Primrose buds
To break in bloom
Pale yellow
Among the sheltered
Drifts of snowdrops
In the woodland fringe.
Now is heard the blackbird
Faltering in to courting song
High upon branches
Of the yet bare chestnut
By the churchyard wall
And celandines
Cosily unfold
Creviced in the hedgebanks
Low along the lee.
In warming afternoons
Upon the gentle breeze
Distant sounds of tractors
Turning the rich red earth
On seaward slopes unseen
Mingles with the bleating
Of the season's
First born lambs.
MIKE EVANS
(St. Florence,
February 10, 1989).