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TA K E H E A RT

A Conversation in Poetry

Edited & Introduced by Wesley McNair, Maine Poet Laureate

Take Heart: A Conversation in Poetry is produced in collaboration with the Maine Writers & Publishers Alliance. Poem copyright © 1994 by David R. Godine. Reprinted from “Where the Deer Were,” David R. Godine, 1994, by permission of David R. Godine. Questions about submitting to Take Heart may be directed to David Turner, Special Assistant to the Maine Poet Laureate, at 207-228-8263 or poetlaureate@mainewriters.org.

Few poets can match the image-making of Appleton’s Kate Barnes. Her gift with the image is on full display in this week’s poem.

April and then May

by Kate Barnes

April and then May, violets up in the feld,

the ewes with their twin lambs;

time has decided to turn into spring again after all.

The maples are unfolding their leaves, chives stand green at the kitchen door, the black fies have decided to come back;

and the work mare has her new foal capering over bluets in the pasture, and the hall smells of daffodils;

and everything is divinely ordinary— the deep ruts in the feld track,

the spring overfowing, the excited swallows, the apple trees

budding for perhaps the hundredth time— and the pruned boughs budding too that must bloom just where they lie.