‘‘half-past nine and warm enough

to nudge a crocus out of its benumbing

winter sleep, grey swales of greysplotched

grey on grey, erratic windswept drizzle,

the swish swash of milk- and oil trucks slashed

across my trenchsliht vision when….’’

— From “A Break in the Weather,’’ by Paul Mariani (born 1940), poet and long-time literature professor at Boston College. He lives in western Massachusetts.