MARCH

Young March steps from behind the long dark skirt of February, lightly toe-dipping into the fast-flowing year.
Cautiously, she caresses the trees, seeking sanctuary.

Emboldened by their welcome, she feels her feet, shakes off her fear, blows out her cheeks and starts to set her pulses wild,
a challenge, test of strength, a force within, a teen-age mutineer
having a fling; a skirt-lifting Whirling Dervish; a devil child.

Recklessly she shoots the rapids of the rooftops, searches every cranny for things to play with, until they’re spoiled.

A deceit of tempo lulls us, as she seems to slow and stop.
Her power drives her on though, without slackening, hurling dustbins, screaming like a banshee down chimneys, through locks.

The damage?…of no consequence. It’s beyond her reckoning.
Exhausted, spent, she succumbs to April’s gentle beckoning.

© Marion Sharville