"When Green Buds They Were Swelling"

<-----Up, up, up to the light.

The word, "May" had a lot of significance in my family. It housed three birthdays--grandmother, mother, daughter. There was Cinco de Mayo on which day there would be the playing of the Mexican birthday song, "Las Mananitas." There was the Maypole with its extravagant ribbons, the next best thing to flowers. There was my mother singing tunelessly, "'Twas in the merry month of May when green buds they were swelling" which brought tears to my eyes because of the sad tale of Barb'ry Allen. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EFHTJ08U_Fg It occurs to me this would have been one of the songs Jenny Lind would have had in her repertoire as it dates back to the early 18th Century. And there was May Frank, the prairie journalism teacher who convinced her students--my dad being one of them, and Aunt Stella on the other side of the A's and U's (aunts and uncles)-- that eye exercises would prevent blindness. May married a younger man named Joe Rhoades. I'm not sure if he went blind or what the motivation was but they started two important projects: a center for the blind and a community garden. I met them in New York City when I was eight so I'm guessing that somewhere close by are descendants of their zucchini. I wrote a poem about the month of May,"Oh where was I when April passed that tousled child of spring?" Unfortunately, the rest didn't measure up to the first line. No reprint here! Speaking of writing, the book The Meaning of Anxiety comes to mind. It was written by Rollo May who spent three years in a sanatorium for tuberculosis patients. He whiled away his time wisely mostly reading Kierkegaard, a huge influence. There was the game, "Mother, may I?" played in a different era definitely. Does anybody say, "May I?' anymore? There was my blue bottle collection. The catalyst was finding a two inch blue bottle replica of the Cape May Lighthouse. And "may"be my favorite of All Things May is "May it be an evening star shines upon you" from the Fellowship of the Ring, the beginning of the grand Lord of the Rings adventure. Lastly,let us not forget to cap things off with the blob blessings prefaced by three dots and, "may."

...may the month of tiny wildflowers peeking bring you blessings of beauty...