Red Buds on a Red Bud Tree
By Dave
Spring arrives not with trumpet nor drum,
But with a whisper —
A breath that stirs the dust along forgotten paths.
The air, thin as memory, shivers through brittle limbs
And finds there, poised like quiet fire,
The first red buds —
Frail gestures of defiance, clinging to the cold.
The earth, still bruised by winter's hand,
Stirs in silence.
Roots remember their purpose,
Stretching downward like forgotten prayers.
The ground, sodden and stubborn,
Offers no promises — only persistence.
Yet still the red buds bloom,
Fingers of flame against the skeletal sky.
Red buds on a red bud tree.
The wind comes restless, listless,
A voice that circles but never lands.
It rattles shutters and stirs the gutters,
Collecting leaves like regrets along the curb.
Beneath this wind, the red buds tremble —
Their petals thin as whispers,
Their color blood-bright against bark like ash.
Here is beauty that knows its brevity —
A flicker, a breath, a fading flare.
Red buds daring on a red bud tree.
And when the rain comes — as it must —
The red buds remain, wet with their own vanishing.
Petals loosen, fall, and vanish
Into the soil they once defied.
The tree stands quiet, its work completed,
Its embers surrendered to the earth.
All that remains is the memory —
A brief burning written in blood and bloom.
Red buds fading on a red bud tree.
The branches will green in their absence.
The wind will forget their name.
Yet something lingers —
A whisper of crimson,
A promise that beauty blooms not in certainty,
But in risk.
And we, who have watched their quiet blaze,
Will remember.
Red buds on a red bud tree.