Saturday Centus: A Review

I'm going to a women's conference today, but I couldn't miss the chance to jump on board with a highly interesting "shake-up" assignment from Jenny Matlock. Today, rather than write mini-fiction or poems ourselves, we've been asked to review someone else's offering from last week. I have chosen a poem by Rinkly Rhymes, entitled "April Showers." Here it is, for your perusal and enjoyment. My review of Rinkly's work, which follows her verse, will be in red.

APRIL SHOWERS by Rinkly Rhymes

I remember the tide of optimism; Summer was on its way.

Winter was receding; April heralded May.

As a girl I felt the sap rising higher, ever higher

As though everything in Nature was working to conspire

Against greyness, cold and lethargy, against discipline and school!

Then, every year it seemed the same, I became an April Fool;

While my heart was singing Summer songs down came the April Showers,

Battering the brave young leaves, decapitating flowers!

'Not yet!' the showers seemed to say; 'You still have a way to go.

Don't you feel a little chilly? We may even turn to snow!'

Was it good for my soul, maybe, to cope with disappointment,

When Summer made a date with me and then missed the appointment?

June, July and August still waved a beckoning finger,

But Winter kept a strangle-hold, determined it must linger.

And yet, that very fickleness was part of the Springtime joy.

Yes, April could be tantalising, teasing us, being coy.

But here, in another country, where Springtime just strolls in,

Where hardly anything marks the time when the warmer months begin,

I remember April Showers with a rush of real affection

And my heart is on a journey in a Northerly direction.

The Review, by yours truly:

This poetic personification of nature by Ms. Rhymes will resonate with any reader who has experienced the melange of expectation, disappointment, and lingering memory that is part of every season in life, personal or weather-related. Who hasn’t felt the “tide of optimism” summer brings, the literal and figurative “sap rising higher” of winter’s end, only to become an “April Fool” as newly flowering hope is decapitated? Spring’s rush of anticipation is both stranglehold and joy: beckoning at first, then dashed by a tantalizing fickleness that teases and pleases in turn––the essence of opposition in all things, a perfect dichotomy.

As the poet implies, such richness is far better remembered than surrendered.

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