March 9, 2021
The Only Planet We Have
First sunny day in a week of winter grays —
where weeks without end
last eight or nine days,
particularly in February
when the snow gods have pocketed
their blessings and headed north,
leaving us with thirty-four degree rains
and teasing snow showers, even
though the ubiquitous Chesapeake
churns and chops below forty degrees
and conditions are receptive:
marshes rimmed in cracked ice, the
ground unforgivingly hard underfoot.
Even the herons have abandoned
sunbathing in the tweedy conifers —
except for today when the wildly
optimistic forecasters have promised
more than a glimpse of fifty, and
the herons, hawks and eagles,
who fly free of expectation and the
emotional bog that can be February,
know deep in the hollow roots
of their downiest feathers
that life simmers below tufted
icy surfaces and willingly accept
the casual duality of winter.
That seasonal cycles must be born
to make way for the next,
to gestate something better —
especially when better means
continuation and advancement
of life on this, our only goldilocks planet.
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