Like this:

After ten years on the farm

Spring is creeping round again

The slowly melting snow

Reveals fringes and then patches of green.

The spring flowers are starting

Green stems appear in their usual place

Harbingers of the beauty to come.

The early lambs gambol on the grass

They had known nothing but snow until now.

When I first came here I loved the spring

I sat entranced by the beauty around me

Listening to the song birds

And marveling at the beauty of the wildflowers.

Today, Spring calls me out with a trumpet.

Like a solider going to war, I emerge

From my winter’s enforced quiet.

The broken fence boards cry out

Like neglected infants, they know

If I notice them, I have to fix them.

The gravel driveway is just a mud track

The gravel sits on pushed up snow banks

Daring me to catch it and put it back where it belongs.

In the north field, the circling buzzards

Mark what must be that missing goat

I will have to walk a mile to look,

The ground is still too soft for my truck.

The small barn door needs repairs, and

The big door is off its track again.

My arms and back ache at the thought.

I think I miss the snow.

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