Winter always feels like a struggle to survive, but in the back of my mind I always know that it wonβt be long until the Trillium are blooming again. The burden of seasonal depression and chronic illness is lightened somewhat by the prospect of seeing these early ephemerals emerge from the forest floorβending their long slumber beneath the soil. Every year I promise myself that I will live to see (meet) another Trillium in spring, and every year I am enraptured by the sheer beauty of this genus.
The photo above and poem below are of/inspired by the Yellow Wakerobin (Trillium luteum). Both are by me, of course!
the black of winter devours every fragment of light,
and i dream of the day that your magic will take flight
upon the grays of ash and sycamore,
beyond the creek bed that ever wants for more.
pressing my cold cheek against the sopping ground,
i feel your warmth yet hear no sound.
the sun pirouettes low on the mountaintops.
my heart begins to quicken, and then it drops.
cardamine churlishly bares her teeth.
lonicera, the bitch, takes no pity on me.
i won't see you tomorrow
nor the day that followsβ
but as if by some wild contract you are no longer bound,
you finally appear to me, gleaming, in verdant dress and golden crown.
