Sunday Morning, Los Angeles Poem by Linda Hepner

Here pours the sun through my open kitchen window,
Clear and biting like the coffee,
Vivid like the marmalade upon the wooden table,
Yellow like the butter in the pancake pan,
Sweet and biting like the maple syrup
Suffusing all the air with rushing,
The neighbor’s flower patch shimmering with wings
Of butterflies, while from the bougainvillea
A reckless mockingbird woos his lover
Who answers note for note from her high perch
Above our wanton wisteria.
But is it spring? There are so many false arrivals;
Daffodils that poke their blatant primary color
Through the dank earth, Icelandic poppies
Responding to the earliest sign of sun,
Squirrels feasting on the juice-warm oranges.
There go the jogging ladies: I can see
How they have shed like blankets from a bed
And run in scanty tank-tops. But we two-legged mammals
Are willingly deceived: the distant mountain thaw
Is hope enough and we moult heedless of the north-east cloud formations
Coming our way, coming our way.

Today
I must report had shifted from
Some long encompassing weather pattern
To a subtle climate change:
Only a lazy buzz
Alerted me that the window had let in
A Californian scarab born of sun,
Intelligence supreme, survival sure,
A black and busy bluebottle
Musing around to find a place,
A peaceful springtime place,
My home the place,
For this short season.

LRH
3.19.06