When Spring descends on Appalachia, I feel its gentle breath everywhere.
Grandmother shakes and fluffs the featherbeds and lays them in the sun.
Old men shed their long underwear. A new season has begun.
Newborn babies always seem to come in the Spring. Baby lambs, chicks and
ducks are thriving everywhere. Even the ugly duckling, like magic, becomes a
swan and floats away on the little creek nearby.
Orchards in white gowns of blossoms, bees looking for the sweet nectar.
Men plowing steep, dark earth, anxious to see crops again.
Young and old women sit in the sun on the porch, let down their long hair
and brush and braid it till it shines with new life. They mend old, wornout
overalls and make do, year after year. Talk over the best times and the best
signs of the Almanac to plant the garden.
Children run barefoot in green grass, oftimes in the early morning dew.
The girls pick early apples to be fried for breakfast. Boys look for June
bugs to fly on a strong piece of Mother's thread.
I take my favorite, sacred walk up the cool hollow path where nature is
silent. But when I listen with my heart and feel with my bare feet the
awakening of the dark green lush of earth, I know in my soul it's Spring
again in Appalachia. And I'm glad.
