Blue, Green, Red and Purple: My Spring
…But for me, I know exactly when it’s Spring:
It’s that moment when, suddenly one morning,
I open my wardrobe door - and there is NOTHING to put on…
For Betty Collins Spring heralds a time to go shopping.
Other people’s springs are about the last of runnels in the mud,
Dark wet twigs, bumpy with swelling lumps as eager sap rises,
Growing turgid;, fit to burst:
And the sound of rustling in the evergreens
As mynahs jostle for position:
Begin to stir and hop and even twitter.
Other people’s springs are complaints about how long the cold weather is hanging on
And surely it was not as wet as this, this time last year?
They say you must wait until the blossoms explode all in one day
Pink and white and dazzling
And the lorikeets are screeching at each other, desperately
Fighting it out for their own bit of real estate:
And the wattle birds without a pause
Go “Earthquake, Earthquake”
But for me, I know exactly when it’s Spring:
It’s that moment when, suddenly one morning,
I open my wardrobe door - and there is NOTHING to put on.
All those stunning styles which I have been wearing with confidence every day,
Which I snuggled into happily only yesterday,
Now suddenly are dull and old,
Their day has gone,
Their bloom has gone,
And I have
Nothing to wear.
My blood rises, pumps furiously,
Effervesces:
It’s time to sprout new feathers
Change my plumage,
Abandon winter
Burst into Spring.
Go Shopping.
