The wind blows through
my clothes—limp flags at rest—
And cool-handed
kissed flesh awake
close enough to stretch from stalk to stem
to heart un-ready for spring’s rhizome reach
I am she who swerves
I didn’t see it coming
say some
their heads
fallen, sheared fate
I like the idea of azaleas
the hum of others’ ideas
independent of low lows and high highs
their resilience in unpredictable weather
Spring rain
Spring sun
Spring gale
Spring snow
I’ve learned you can’t depend on
what will be here
one day to the next
But some have learned to wait
Soil’s rising temperature
prod bulbs’ elegant pierce
hard packed dirt and tangled brack
give way to messy margins
wintered seeds evade gangster
sweet toothed squirrels
I have been yearning to practice the voice
a garden off grid is certainty abandoned
yet fruitful within its gates—
and a nod to errant weeds truant explorations
gives ground to the possibility to live a new
Life. Unconfined. Undomesticated yet calm.
I felt the wind blow through me. A gale. Cool and red-handed coming close to me. Reminded. That Spring releases roots’ spiraling. We couldn’t predict how it would come. An unstoppable and unharnessed hush.
In 1999, an annual series of commissioned writings on contemporary art to be published in these pages was inaugurated. The preceding poem continues this tradition.
Erica Hunt is a poet, essayist, and editor. The author of six books, she was a Literature Fellow at the American Academy in Rome in 2024 and the recipient of an FCA Grants to Artists award in 2001.