March gifts: all of a sudden, rain, falling every morning 
when I wake, reassuring fine rain that will not hurt us. 
And primroses, unabashed, cheerful as
crayons in the flower beds. Gulf streams of pollen 
hazing the atmosphere; in Marin, wild irises growing 
beside freshets and cascades, not far from where
the last few salmon struggle up streams broken through
to the sea by rain. My mother, born in March, who bled
from her poorly tied umbilical cord into the straw tick and lived, 
even though her blood dripped onto the floor.
Inside, deep odors of jasmine and freesia; outside somewhere, 
bees stumble, pollen-heavy, dazed
with what must be a kind of joy. So much newness;
even the banana slugs—bright, slow, cold—have come back.