'Always March, never May'

Above: From the Lake (c.1924) by Georgia O'Keeffe

It is always spring in Nowhere. But there were no cherry blossoms, no daffodils or new hens, only the cold dark mud of snow just melted, the trees stripped naked, bare arms flung up pleading for the sun, the smell of green but not the green itself. Every day was the day before the first crocus breaks the skull of the earth, the held breath before beginning can begin. Always March, never May.

from "No One Dies in Nowhere" in The Future is Blue by Catherynne M. Valente