April, Come She Will . . .

The Farmers’ Almanac often shares folk wisdom from bygone days. “Three snows after the forsythia blooms” is one such tidbit. Since forsythia grows in zones 3-9, the prophecy is dubious, at best. What we do know for sure is that for all its beauty, its cheerful explosion of color in a landscape just shaking off the muted tones of winter, forsythia is not a native plant, but an 18th century immigrant. It’s been around long enough that when we think of our childhood landscapes, it’s often there, looking pretty and old-fashioned, something the grandfolk may have planted. Forsythia grows well in the Midcoast, and its cup-shaped yellow blossoms are some of the first to flower in spring. Garden Plants For Honey Bees gives forsythia the thumbs down for the value of its nectar and pollen (which some varieties don’t even produce). The New York Botanical Garden calls the usual varieties “tired and overused,” but they recommend a dwarf species that bellows bright in spring and then sits quietly in its garden corner for the rest of the year. Even Web MD weighs in: “Forsythia is used for airway illnesses, swelling, fever, and other conditions. But there is no good scientific research to support any use.” Fortunately, there are early-blooming native shrubs that bear yellow flowers and please the bees as well: fothergilla and spicebush, witch hazel and golden currant are four of them. As for being “useful,” here’s what poet Ada Limón has to say about forsythia:

Forsythia

At the cabin in Snug Hollow near McSwain Branch creek, just spring, all the animals are out, and my beloved and I are lying in bed in a soft silence. We are talking about how we carry so many people with us wherever we go, how even simple living, these unearned moments, are a tribute to the dead. We are both expecting to hear an owl as the night deepens. All afternoon, from the porch, we watched an Eastern towhee furiously build her nest in the untamed forsythia with its yellow spilling out into the horizon. I told him that the way I remember the name forsythia is that when my stepmother, Cynthia, was dying, that last week, she said lucidly, but mysteriously, More yellow. And I thought yes, more yellow and nodded because I agreed. Of course, more yellow. And so now in my head, when I see that yellow tangle, I say, For Cynthia, for Cynthia, forsythia, forsythia, more yellow. It is night now. And the owl never comes, only more of night and what repeats in the night.

© 2022, Ada Limón
From: The Hurting Kind
Publisher: Milkweed Editions

from Poetry International

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