The First Daffodil

In my front yard, among everything brown, I found the first open daffodil of the season.

forever unplucked
among everything brown
the first daffodil

©Rae Hallstrom

It's a plain yellow daffodil. It doesn't have a white center, and it's not the jumbo-sized type, with petals that scream yellow as if in ALL CAPS.

It's not a jonquil, a daffodil parading about with a high-class name.

It's just a simple little daffodil, probably the same variety that's been in gardens for 50 years or more.

I don't even remember planting it, but it occurs to me now that I must have had a pot of daffodils last spring, purchased from the grocery store when the skies were gray and I needed something cheery in the house. After the flowers died off, I must have planted the pot-bound roots in the mulch by the sidewalk that leads to my front door.

Now there is that one canary-yellow trumpet, followed by two more that are halfway open, and a fourth still tight in bud.

It is spring, and I feel lucky, even though my garbage disposal broke yesterday, and my deep freezer broke a week ago, and even though I learned that the gas gauge on my car broke only by running out of gas.

The air is not yet sweet, but I can see the sweetness coming in the first daffodil.

Japanese haiku captures the sweetness and the simplicity of spring and asks nothing else but to be present, and to see, in whatever way you can.

My name is Rae Hallstrom, and Ameriku is my art and my business and my brand.

Ameriku® is the registered trademark of Ameriku Ltd. When you see the Ameriku trademark, you can be sure the work meets my high standards of quality.