Last weekend I found myself downtown with a little time to kill, so I went to the bookstore. I’m usually slow to make a decision at the bookstore, but this time I marched straight to the poetry section and picked up some Billy Collins and checked out. Then I sat on a bench, listening to a banjo-strumming busker and straining my eyes in the friscalating dusk light while I waited for my dining companions to arrive.

Collins’ “Today” was on Poppy’s memorization list a few years ago, because it makes me feel buoyant every time I read it and I hoped it would do the same for her. (As it turns out: She doesn’t remember memorizing it. I guess we’ll put it on next year’s list!) I wasn’t familiar with his other work, and I was happy to find that most everything in “Aimless Love” is just as accessible as “Today.” Here’s one of my favorites:

Litany

by Billy Collins

You are the bread and the knife.
The crystal goblet and the wine …
– Jacque Crickillon

You are the bread and the knife,
the crystal goblet and the wine.
You are the dew on the morning grass
and the burning wheel of the sun.
You are the white apron of the baker
and the marsh birds suddenly in flight.

However, you are not the wind in the orchard,
the plums on the counter,
or the house of cards.
And you are certainly not the pine-scented air.
There is no way you are the pine-scented air.

It is possible that you are the fish under the bridge,
maybe even the pigeon on the general’s head,
but you are not even close
to being the field of cornflowers at dusk.

And a quick look in the mirror will show
that you are neither the boots in the corner
nor the boat asleep in its boathouse.

It might interest you to know,
speaking of the plentiful imagery of the world,
that I am the sound of rain on the roof.

I also happen to be the shooting star,
the evening paper blowing down an alley,
and the basket of chestnuts on the kitchen table.

I am also the moon in the trees
and the blind woman’s tea cup.
But don’t worry, I am not the bread and the knife.
You are still the bread and the knife.
You will always be the bread and the knife,
not to mention the crystal goblet and — somehow — the wine.

I get the American Life in Poetry column in my inbox every week. I used to read every poem, but I’ve gotten out of the habit. I’m glad I read this week’s. It’s reminded me that Spring is out there.

American Life in Poetry: Column 462
By Ted Kooser
U.S. Poet Laureate

This year’s brutal winter surely calls for a poem such as today’s selection, a peek at the inner workings of spring. Susan Kelly-DeWitt lives and teaches in Sacramento.

Apple Blossoms
by Susan Kelly-DeWitt

One evening in winter
when nothing has been enough,
when the days are too short,

the nights too long
and cheerless, the secret
and docile buds of the apple

blossoms begin their quick
ascent to light. Night
after interminable night

the sugars pucker and swell
into green slips, green
silks. And just as you find

yourself at the end
of winter’s long, cold
rope, the blossoms open

like pink thimbles
and that black dollop
of shine called

bumblebee stumbles in.

American Life in Poetry is made possible by The Poetry Foundation (www.poetryfoundation.org), publisher of Poetry magazine. It is also supported by the Department of English at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Poem copyright ©2001 by Susan Kelly-DeWitt, whose most recent book of poems is The Fortunate Islands, Marick Press, 2008. Poem reprinted from To a Small Moth, Poet’s Corner Press, 2001, by permission of Susan Kelly-DeWitt and the publisher. Introduction copyright © 2014 by The Poetry Foundation. The introduction’s author, Ted Kooser, served as United States Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress from 2004-2006. We do not accept unsolicited manuscripts.