Here are a couple of the poems we put in our May baskets yesterday, along with the wildflowers we picked in the vacant lots behind the mall. Who says you can’t get close to nature in Major Suburbia?

A delicate fabric of bird song 

Floats in the air, 

The smell of wet wild earth

 Is everywhere. 

Red small leaves of the maple
Are clenched like a hand,
Like girls at their first communion
The pear trees stand.
Oh I must pass nothing by 

Without loving it much, 

The raindrop try with my lips,
The grass with my touch; 

For how can I be sure

 I shall see again 

The world on the first of May 

Shining after the rain?
- Sara Teasdale, May Day

Now the bright morning-star, Day’s harbinger,

Comes dancing from the East, and leads withher

The flowery May, who from her green lap throws

The yellow cowslip and the pale primrose.

Hail, bounteous May, that dost inspire

Mirth, and youth, and warm desire!

Woods and groves are of thy dressing;

Hill and dale doth boast thy blessing.

Thus we salute thee with our early song,

And welcome thee, and wish thee long.
-
John Milton, Song on a May Morning, 1660

May is Get Caught Reading Month:

Tete d’une Femme Lisant

Art Print

Picasso, Pablo


Buy at AllPosters.com

I asked the urchins what this picture was, and they had multiple answers: two people kissing, weird, colored body parts . . . I had one of the French-speaking urchins translate the title: “Head of a Girl Reading.”