for the TROLL THREAD Collective
I was invited to give a poetry reading in Buffalo, New York April 7th. This is a time when spring is in FULL BLOOM in Philadelphia, while the land in Buffalo is still asleep with winter 400 miles to the north. On the train I had a photograph of snowy treetops and another of a worm-stuffed robin with violets. Every 10 minutes I would look out the window. While what I saw was spring, I would hold the picture of winter to the window, step hard on a piece of broken plastic placed in my shoe and say, "THIS IS DEAD!" At the midway the pictures were switched, and I pressed into my now bleeding foot to say "THIS IS ALIVE!" Notes for the poem were taken all along the rail. Spring rolled back into winter, the only season America deserves.
