Spring has taken its sweet time arriving here in Racine. But after weeks of noncommittal rainy, windy weather, it seems we have arrived at a steady springtime rhythm.

It looks like robins in the nest over our patio and daffodils already past their bloom. It’s all-day sun and grilling out on week nights. It’s reaching for sweaters less often and packing sunscreen in the bag. It’s wanting to linger in parks and take the longer walk.

It’s May, and thank goodness for that.

I’ve found there are a lot of poems written about this month. I think that’s because the turning after a long winter speaks to both the immediate and the imaginable. It’s a tactile month and an existential month too.

So this week (or really this month), I’m prompting us to write a poem about May that speaks to the immediacy of the month but stretches toward the meaning of it all.

Questions that will guide my own writing and reflecting include:
What does the robin returning to the worn out nest make you think of?
What are you feeling as you see just how far the daffodils have spread this year?
What are you noticing about yourself as the weather warms? Does your hair or skin feel different? Is your attitude better?
What’s in your fridge and why?
Does seeing a bumble bee again amaze you? What about the trees blossoming?
Did you remember what it all looked, smelled, felt like?
Are you somehow surprised spring is here again?

There’s something sweet about a poem that’s so specific, it becomes universal. Your May poem, while I could never write what you would write, could easily be my May poem too.

Here are a few May poems for your reading this week:

May
By Mary Oliver

May, and among the miles of leafing,
blossoms storm out of the darkness—
windflowers and moccasin flowers. The bees
dive into them and I too, to gather
their spiritual honey. Mute and meek, yet theirs
is the deepest certainty that this existence too—
this sense of well-being, the flourishing
of the physical body—rides
near the hub of the miracle that everything
is a part of, is as good
as a poem or a prayer, can also make
luminous any dark place on earth.

May Day
By Sara Teasdale

A delicate fabric of bird song

  Floats in the air,

The smell of wet wild earth

  Is everywhere.

Red small leaves of the maple

  Are clenched like a hand,

Like girls at their first communion

  The pear trees stand.

Oh I must pass nothing by

  Without loving it much,

The raindrop try with my lips,

  The grass with my touch;

For how can I be sure

  I shall see again

The world on the first of May

  Shining after the rain?

As notes, it’s May, which means I’ve got two months left as Racine’s writer in residence. If you’ve been following along and/or have Racine-related poems you’re hoping to share, send them my way at sklblauren@gmail.com. I’m hoping these weeks of prompts and participation lead to a little anthology of sorts showcasing the place we call home and its people.

Happy Monday,
L.A. Sklba