Spring stirs in her sleep,

stretches,

tentative tautness, this seeping skin,

this catch in the throat

too afraid to name hope

as predecessor;

life labours in a womb

swollen with the earth’s

heartbeat and

fed by soil’s

placenta. She croons in her dreams,

low mourning dove cries wrenched

from a heart full, overflowing

its banks; her sighs are the

wind in the pussy-willows,

her song the cry of geese on

the wing.