Spring ----- Maple Sap & Question Mark Butterfly

Here we are in mid March and the syrup bucket is void of sap. Mother nature refuses to really make a sincere effort to get it on. The day I tapped, it gushed like Ann used to gush over me, just flowed, and I like a fool thought spring was on us. But the following day it went to fifty and then at night to thirty eight. This is the harvest, an empty bucket. It was as if the flow was over, spring fast moving to summer. The following two days the same.


In fact, on the third day this Question Mark Butterfly showed up in my studio wanting to go outside and seek flowers, to make love to. I kept him in figuring that being out that day might seem fun, but the weather people announced cold was coming and it seemed he'd fair better by the fire. At night, I am sure, he found an away place to sit out the rest of winter and then show up later in the spring to look for girls. Strange it was a Question Mark. I had a few of those myself---questions that is.


The next day it went cold and again the bucket stayed empty, staring at me like an spent beer mug that needed filling. Speaking of beer maybe that is my only hope, the only liquid available to me, and an elixir to hold me over until it is time to boil a total off fifteen gallons of sap I have collected to date. Here it is the 22nd and I have but an empty glass.

I'm ready, the noisy Sandhills are back, Robins are about and I am tired of being inside.