This is Poetry Moment on WPSU – a weekly program featuring the work of contemporary Pennsylvania poets. Your host is poet and author Marjorie Maddox, a 2023 Monson Arts Fellow, author of more than 20 books, and Professor Emerita of English and creative writing at the Lock Haven campus of Commonwealth University.
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Welcome to Poetry Moment.
As of March 20th, spring is here! But what does the calendar know, anyway? It’s the weather that determines whether we grab a sweater and head out into fresh air and its promise of new beginnings. Poet Rachael Lyon sets the scene with today’s poem, “First Rain of Spring.” You won’t need your umbrella, but if you inhale deeply enough, you just might catch a whiff of spring rain.
Rachael Lyon is a poet, essayist, and translator, living in State College. Her chapbook, The Normal Heart and How It Works, is a love letter to her defective heart. She translates poetry from German, for which she received a Fulbright grant to Vienna, Austria. Lyon’s work has appeared in over thirty publications, including The Southern Review and The Hopkins Review. She teaches writing at Penn State and runs a local reading series called Hometown Voices.
You may recognize this memorable definition of spring from the novel The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett: “[Spring] is the sun shining on the rain and the rain falling on the sunshine.”
Likewise, Rachael Lyon’s poem, “First Rain of Spring,” portrays a season of beautiful, noisy, rain-soaked newness. Everything is connected; hope is abundant.
Here’s “First Rain of Spring” by Rachael Lyon
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Everywhere the earth breaks open.
The smell of wet dirt fills my house and bleeds
into my dreams. Worms crawl up
from rain-soaked ground and lift
their heads, blinking their worm-blinks,
full of the wisdom of winter.
Toddlers from the daycare down the block
hold their handled rope and shriek
beneath a covered walkway,
practice outside voices, delight in raw sound.
What hope is stirred by the promise of spring,
by the growth coming up underfoot? Though
I know in my bones what the months ahead hold,
the back-breaking worry and work,
their laughter contaminates my mouth,
eats away like snowmelt, like wet sun.
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That was “First Rain of Spring” by Rachael Lyon. Thanks for listening.
Listen for Poetry Moment with Marjorie Maddox Mondays during Morning Edition and All Things Considered on WPSU. You can more episodes at wpsu.org/poetrymoment.
Our theme music is by Eric Ian Farmer.
