Sprung

On Wednesday, spring arrived.

I heard it in the darkness before dawn, when the tree frogs began croaking in chorus, and two different bird species took up an obbligato—too impatient to wait for the sunrise.

I felt it in the change of the air I breathed in, warmer, wetter, charged with energy prepared to burst.

I saw it when the sun burst upon the world and revealed grass suddenly green and buds crowding the early trees.

I touched it in the soft give of the earth beneath the garden fork, as I turned over the thatch to make room for new plants.

I smelled it in the pungent odor of the dirt mere inches from my nose as I flattened myself on the berm beside the trail and dozed in the speckled sunlight.

For the beauty of the earth,
For the glory of the skies,
For the love which from my birth
Over and around us lies,
Lord of all, to thee I raise
This my hymn of grateful praise.