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.