POETRY JAM - ALMONDS

“Try to keep your soul young and quivering right up to old age.” - George Sand

Poetry Jam has given its followers the theme of “Almonds” this week. This is quite appropriate for us in the Southern Hemisphere, as the almond trees have blossomed exuberantly this week – remembering that our August is the wintry equivalent of February in the North. The rashness of the almond tree, blooming in what is effectively still Winter, is proverbial. And yet, the tree flowers and sets fruit, yielding a crop of delicious nuts…

Almond Blossom

In Winter’s last throes, when snow and sleet still fall,
When icy winds shake the bare and thorny branches,
The almond tree breaks out in full bloom –
Defiantly, or foolishly perhaps,
Its candid blossoms, as if of snow fashioned.

When shivering passers-by, chance beneath the tree
The petals fall, like fragrant snowflakes,
Covering woollens and Winter hats with blossom;
There’s hope promised and a quickening of the blood,
With hints of Spring in frozen atmosphere expressed.

As years weigh heavily on my bent shoulders,
And as my skin wrinkles every day even more deeply,
My heart thrills and beats a little faster –
Defiantly, or foolishly perhaps,
Its pulse intense and strong, as if I were an adolescent.

When passers-by see my smiling face, they smile back,
Unknowingly, my mood proving contagious
And making them glow with unexplained elation;
There’s hope promised and a quickening of the blood,
With hints of love, even in hardened arteries felt.