Maple Blossoms

Have you ever looked at a maple blossom? I never had until today. I was bad to pluck a twig from the tree outside my window, but to get close enough I had to. I always thought the husks were red, and that's why the first colors of spring seemed to be the colors of autumn... Well, they are, but I was wrong about why!

The brownish pod opens and bright red tendrils emerge. Stamens I guess, I'm not a botanist and so unsure... There seem to be numerous pistils, or perhaps more stamens? Or perhaps the blossoms are paired! Between the two on the end of my twig is another waiting (too young) to open. Outside my window the glints of red are subtle on the background of a blue-white sky.

Spring has announced itself mighty early for the far north of Minnesota! I am thrilled and apprehensive. Could this mean the earliest spring since I've been here, or that more harsh winter has yet to manifest itself? I prefer to think that the Maid has emerged and brought with her the bounty that is Springtime...

I know it wasn't right of me
To take inside the twig
But for me to see it clear
I had to see it big

And what do I behold within
The bud from that there tree?
A tiny universe itself
And more I cannot see

Towers red and tall that curve
And beckon to the sun
Calling out for Maids of Hives
And wind to have their fun

To bring the pollen to the womb
To give the gift of seeds
To busy off to other realms
And slake the many's needs

And soon to grow and fall to earth
The harbinger of life
The whirling gift, the joyous laugh
The ground the seed makes wife

And spindling from the dirt does grow
The slimmest greening shaft
The infant tree, the sky to know
The Maid so gleeful laughed!

But that is all yet to unfold
The twig within my hand
Though a million sisters bold
This one shall not meet land

What woe then must befall me
That I've this blossom plucked
The Maid forgive, it was for this
Don't let my life be --

For only blossoms there be four
And whirlybirds a million more
I think the Maid might spare her spite
If I do dishes every night...

What were the seeds of maples called before there were helicopters? That's what I've always called them. Or are maple seeds the reason helicopters are called "whirlybirds"?

These pages, artwork, photographs, and design are
Copyright © 2000 by John J Gabarron, IV.
Reproduction is prohibited without written permission of the author/artist.