THE FIRST DAY OF SPRING and we are reminded of renewal. Of a green and living world. Of softness more than harshness. Of the flow of things rather than the locking down of things. Of returns and cycles and aspiring growth. Although here in the North these things have not yet arrived upon the landscape, they are on their way, and change is in the air we breathe and the ground under our feet, in the messages of birds and the freshening of breezes.

Many of us long for renewal and refreshment, aspiring growth and a softening of harshness, in our cultural world as well as our natural world. We may have to wait longer than we want. We may have to endure more dark winter nights. We may have to do our own small bit to be a part of it, but it will come. Spring will come. You can’t stop it.
“Spring comes, and the grass grows by itself”—Zen saying.

The image is of pale pink corydalis, my favorite wildflower, which grows and blooms in the harshest environment imaginable—upon the hard, bedrock outcrops of the North Country. There, growing out of the granite, in the wind and the sun and the storms, with almost no soil to cling to, it flaunts its little flag of color. It endures in tender toughness, and in beauty.