Spring is the season of renewal, but its nature reveals itself more fully when we understand the season that precedes it. Winter is a time for incubation and rumination. It is the beginning of our future life, a time when thought begins to emerge from the ocean of creative imagination. Winter is a black box, a mysterious space where the formless takes shape, where we put words to thought, the words that will guide the direction of our future life. 

 Did you find that transformative winter magic? The time when the seed undergoes its internal chemistry in preparation for the months to come?

 While it’s true I’m talking about the annual cycle of cold months, the winter is also a metaphor for the quiet moments of reflection in our life where we unconsciously prepare for the future. It is more difficult than ever to find that sacred ruminating space. Instead, we are too often drawn into the 21st Century’s bombardment of information and images in an endless scroll that leaves no imprint on us. The quiet spaces of our lives, waiting in line, the lull of conversation, the in between times, have been sacrificed to this blankness. 15, 20, 30 minutes of scrolling through “content”, a term that seems to imply a filler within an otherwise empty container lacking substance or depth, a place that leaves us feeling anything but content. and we are left with nothing, just lost time, a void in the middle of our lives. The season of winter, the precious moments of reflection, are becoming scarce.

The promise of spring’s transformation does not come by idly. It requires the silent expanse of the winter season, a time of quiet diligence and devotion so we can emerge from our hibernation ready to build a new world. As Mary Oliver (one of the greater holders of spring wisdom) wrote,

In the north country now it is spring and there

Is a certain celebration. The thrush

Has come home. He is shy and likes the

Evening best, also the hour just before

Morning; in that blue and gritty light he

Climbs to his branch, or smoothly

Sails there. It is okay to know only

One song if it is this one. Hear it

Rise and fall; the very elements of you should

Shiver nicely. What would spring be

Without it? Mostly frogs. But don’t worry, he

Arrives, year after year, humble and obedient

And gorgeous. You listen and you know

You could live a better life than you do, be

Softer, kinder. And maybe this year you will

Be able to do it. Hear how his voice

Rises and falls. There is no way to be

Sufficiently grateful for the gifts we are

Given, no way to speak the Lord’s name

Often enough, though we do try, and

Especially now, as that dappled breast

Breathes in the pines and heaven’s

Windows in the north country,

Now spring has come,

Are opened wide.

The seed knows. It hides from the world, buried deep in the earth, nestling in the quiet and the dark. The seed knows it needs that time for its internal magic to develop and take root. And when spring comes, life calls to life. Spring is the time for action, for first steps, it is when thoughts and words turn into deeds, and we begin the building of our new future life.

This is the season of Aries, the first sign, a sign of fire. This is the season of the urge, the time when everything takes on a sheen of beauty, when the hidden pearls of the world spill out of our mouth and life surges everywhere, dripping from the branches, soaked in the soil, shining from the leaves, resounding in the call and song and dance of every living creatures. This is the season of Christ, of resurrection. This is Nowruz, the new day, where we leap with joy over fire, burning away the past, where dormant passion is released and life life life bursts forth from every corner.

As we consider the opportunity of this moment between seasons to build a new future, I’ll share one more poem from Mary Oliver:

Somewhere

a black bear

has just risen from sleep

and is staring

down the mountain.

All night

in the brisk and shallow restlessness

of early spring

I think of her,

her four black fists

flicking the gravel,

her tongue

like a red fire

touching the grass,

the cold water.

There is only one question:

how to love this world.

I think of her

rising

like a black and leafy ledge

to sharpen her claws against

the silence

of the trees.

Whatever else

my life is

with its poems

and its music

and its glass cities,

it is also this dazzling darkness

coming

down the mountain,

breathing and tasting;

all day I think of her—

her white teeth,

her wordlessness,

her perfect love.

Here, amidst the verdant maelstrom, what are you resolved to do? How are you resolved to be? How will you answer life’s call? To whom will you reach out and ask to dance?