We've scraped off the scab of winter, emerging drab

and a little raw into an early spring, urgin the thaw

to pass from slush and sludge to the tender grass

we yearly equate with hope. Daffodils propagate

down the slope of our yard in buoyant disregard

of frost; with them the lightness we feared we'd lost

slips in across the sill. Limpid lemon sun runs

down the walls and we let it pool; birdcalls

once more presage day. As green supplants gray

the air turns soft, the scent of lilac carried aloft

like pappi, or a silent prayer. I pry a pair

of windows up; gloom abates, and rooms

half-filled with stale ennui now exhale

in relief. Blighted souls unfurl. We begin to leaf.

Would I had been pollinated

like yarrow by a bee and not

by this man, grin like a kid

at the candy rack, hand so hot

at the small of my back

it raises a welt like a brand

then my womb a mollusk shell

constructed to shelter each embryo

one born pink as a kitten's tongue,

the other sparrow-scrawny

and me cracking like an egg

breast milk or mealworms it took

all I had, they took all I had

that grin like a lightning bug

on and off, on and off

what little he left us

now those girls scuttle crablike,

all jackknifed arms and legs,

carrying me yoked

like a borrowed home

they'll soon enough outgrow

look how everyone is

always leaving

I was middle-aged, with minor expectations, mildly

content within the edges of my days: stairs, stoop, the grid

of streets, desk, ruled ledgers neatly stacked within reach.

Stolid afternoons lined up like pencils in a drawer.

A horn blared and I turned

to see you rounding up apples that had rolled

into the road. As if aspect had twisted

on its axis, I fell captive to the curve of calf

and cheek, parentheses of hips, parabolas

of laughter that rose like balloons. Heart round

and open as a ruby glass bowl, waiting

to be filled.

I picked up an apple, bruised

and blushed, and set it in the palm

of your hand.