Spring Returns Mid-Lent

The arrival of something / so tender we look away and laugh.
—Ralph Burns

Spring arrives in tender swaths of light
That brush the darkness from the sleeping trees,
And drape the dogwood’s head with wreaths of white.

The chill of winter trembles at the sight—
Opened palms of pink undo the freeze
And thaw the twigs with tender swaths of light.

Some breath from heaven reaches down to smite
The barrenness from boughs thin with disease
And dress their branches in a sleeve of white.

This undeserved salvation from the blight
Of budding things drags doubt down to its knees
And suffocates the gloom in swaths of light.

Only fools who turn their faces might
Mishear the message that the earth decrees—
The King has come in tender swaths of light
To dress the world in resurrection white.