Short for La Primavera
by hakim bellamy
Prima,
at the mere hint of hibiscus and histamine
your name becomes the bogeyman
of all the winters between us.
Your very name
some unspeakable curse of life,
beauty and abundance…
And for the longest,
I find myself confused
as to how other seasons shade you
talk breezy
treat you with such brazen contempt…
until I am reminded
that the first rumor of your name
spells “the end” of the Cold,
and that's cold.
Despised for your magic
the recurring miracle
of pulling more resurrections than Rogaine
out your cap.
For the illumination of bulbs
long thought buried beneath
For the glow. For the grow.
The way out. The truth.
For the lengthening of days.
The hope. The fact that time
and everything after you simply cooks
and dies.
So they talk shit.
Call you nothing but a fever,
say you’ll never be the patron season of love sickness
just a wanna be flu.
Laugh and sarcastically ask
“Why you and Fall never
...I mean rarely, if ever, get babies named after you.”
And all it does is fuel you
fertilize your thirst, for change.
Remind you that the wind is on your side
and unlike Autumn it is always at your back
and never to your face.
The only season that needn’t rely on a holiday
to make everyone anticipate it, including Summer.
Because we all know,
the only thing that really ever made Summer cool
was no school.
You are a mood
a first trimester in full bloom
sprouting a canopy to protect all mothers
and mere mortals from the solstice,
from the soulless.
Like a gaggle of kites
you are a ripcord to a rapture
coming soon.
The color of envy
and it suits you.
The kinda carpet not everyone can pull off,
especially amidst all this brown,
red and clay.
But I can always smell
when you are near.
Heard like a mating dance with no music.
Just the eruption of yucca
and joshua trees,
the playgrounds
re-pollinating themselves
with laughter.
You’ve come back to save us
in the season of bunnies
and bastards, even Jesus
named his most infamous trick after you.
So let them hate you
for coming back from the dead
because without you
our winters
have no end.
