Spring Green

And another newer one. The line "everything is green/ and future tense" is a variation on a line that I have in my head without knowing where it came from: "everything is sweet and present tense". I feel like it might be a line I wrote, but it might easily also be a line I just remember, or even misremember, from a short story or a novel. If anyone knows where it comes from, please tell me!

ETA: Thought about reading this one at Larry's, but didn't. Reworked the second stanza though, and posting that edit.

Spring Green

The grass is starting to green,
The bulbs in the yard
Pushed up through the mud,
Their tender spikes like baby
Asparagus, leaves still furled.
The forsythia has buds of green
But the air is still cold.

Our shoulders hunch
as we face into the wind.
You hold my heart in your soft
right hand and I am so
afraid you will crush it like berries
as you make a fist, hide your hands
in your pockets, to counter the cold.

There is a line between shade
And sun, between what has been
And what will be. I close my eyes,
Bow my head, and walk slowly
Feeling the temperature change
Letting the sun heat my hair
And blossom behind my eyes.

I feel the chill as I walk under
The shade of a sprawling oak tree
Its boughs tipped with pale green
Buds, future leaves, future acorns,
Future trees themselves. I want this
In a way I didn’t know I still could.
At thirty I feel eighteen again, young
And foolish and wanting what I fear,

Only you. Everything is green
And future tense, the tulips
Will bloom purple and red and
Pink, the forsythia will be yellow,
We will walk hand in hand
This summer, bare arms in the sun,
We will not stay frozen forever.