Reflection

Early March seemed almost mine

when I was twelve.  All the world

            revolved around my world

like the globe on its axis spinning

            to my fingered motion.

Emerging from childhood, marking

            the years by St. Pat’s day,

                        I half-believed myself

            to be Irish, half-believed

                        the day was wholly mine.

When March came, I began to sense

            in the winds an inclination

                        for decided metamorphosis,

            larva to chrysalis, mitosis

                        to strongly patterned wings.

The day of my birth, the birth month,

            has the stain of narcissus echoing

                        in its streams, on the hillsides

            the cone-shaped blooms emerge,

                        petals from poisonous bulbs.