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A Flash of Green


It is not that Minnesota winters are so brutal. 
It is that Minnesota winters shape us to be as they are:
winter becomes part of who we are, expected, accepted;
the careful time before the earth greens, again.

There is no record of a seventy degree day in February
in the Twin Cities.  There have been at least two seventy
degree days in Minnesota. This is not one of them.

This day reminded me of a winter in Oslo, Norway,
when the sun did not shine for more than thirty days,
and I watched the sun, when it did show again,
climb tangled up through the spars of a sailing ship
lying in harbor just south of the City Hall. 

Today is gray, unlike many winter days in Minnesota,
where sun on snow is common, lending to an attitude,
making finger-frost easy and depression a chore.
We all know the sun is on our side; that we will win.

So even when it is gray, there is something beautiful;
a flash of green, a good dog, an attitude, an expectation.

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