Primavera

Spring like days, mid-February, tiny white blossoms on narrow plum branches, shower of yellow on the mimosa. Playing by the edge of Thousand Oaks field--ring of old brickwork around an even older oak, tangle of alder and willow down to the stream... Seated there, with guitar, looking out at figures in the sun--the young Asian woman who tosses a ball for her three young children, squatting now on her haunches, in what must be the old country way, so that even her three-year old is taller as she stands wobbily alongside... Approaching, on the other side of the fence, and smiling as she hears the music--Roll on Columbia, in a low voice, blending in with the leaves... This Land Is Your Land, slow as well, thinking of the way Dylan handles it--a kind of recognition, a homage...times remembered, times known...