first day of spring -- snow
crocuses open frail petals
among dead oak leaves
When I leave home on 17 March, it's still winter in Iowa, 14 degrees F with snow on the ground. By the time I park at my sister's home, 100 miles southwest in Kansas, spring has already arrived, with St. Patrick's Day green erupting from bare ground.
On the sunny Spring Equinox, the lilac buds of the snow crocuses open, but instead of poking through snow, they are thrusting up through a thick layer of dry oak leaves.
These appear to be the wild variety, C. tommasinianus. Some intrepid "tommies" are springing straight up through gravel, their delicate petals as luminescent as stained glass.
Six pointed purple petals form a chalice for three inward curving golden anthers surmounted by a ruffled tripartite stigma.
The pollen, the color of turmeric, is so heavy it's spilling onto the delicate petals. No bees in sight, but the sticky stigma will remain moist for quite a long time, waiting for a princess charming to give it a pollinating nuzzle.
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