Lola Ridge




Annunciation

But for the violets…
and earth a gigantic bulb battened down with stone…
violets
at which the wind
makes little shambling rushes,
unsteady wind,
milk-warm and dewy at the mouth,
stumbling and rising again,
smelling of the violets…
and but for the wind
scattering
such scented hearsay,
one might not veer
on this unleavened stone
to the sharp pull of earth
at tension with the violets—
one might hurry on unknowing over the cancelled spring,
spring…horned green
and curly as a ram’s head…
desperately butting against the concrete.