Persephone

The ancients had a goddess for this day: Persephone.

Whisked away to the underworld after the harvest, Persephone was said to take with her all that was green and vital, leaving mortals behind to languish in a barren realm. 

And then, this joyous day, the vernal equinox. From a cleft in the earth, Persephone was said to return, and once more, the world would be awash in color and rampant with new growth.

Today, the first day of spring, found us out in the vineyard, continuing the work we began many cold months ago: pruning back last season's grape canes, leaving behind just those few choice buds we select to bear this season's fruit.

Was the vineyard suddenly different today? Were we awash in color? Did the earth's mantle cleave and release a new birth of life?

Well, all things are relative.

This first day of spring in Canton, Ohio, the sky was leaden.

Snow flurries fell.

A raw wind blew.

Although the blanket of white we tromped through for most of our winter was largely gone, it was not replaced by a verdant carpet, but rather by mud and a thatch of brown turf.

As we finished up the Marquette block and made steady progress through the Frontenac Gris, the rhythm of stainless steel blades snapping through last summer's now dormant growth competed with raucous avian rivalries from a rapidly thawing lake.

Each pruning cut revealed the familiar kiwi green that has fed our winter weary souls through a long frigid season: the response of our resilient grape vines to a season of brutal cold. Encased in dull brown cells of insulating tissue, the vital force of each plant remained visible, even in the dim light of a sun shrouded by flurries. 

And yet, today, something WAS different:

Pruning cut, March 20, 2014

At a certain point in the afternoon, as the sun burned through gray, the brown turf warmed just a few more degrees. 

Not enough warmth to feel a discernible difference on wind chaffed skin, but enough to trigger the movement of vital fluids from grape roots drenched within a thawing terrain. 

Up through craggy six-year old trunks, through cordons stretched horizontally across galvanized trellis wire, and eventually, out, out into the sunshine, the vital fluids of each plant flowed.

The difference we experienced today: those kiwi green pruning cuts glistened.

Sap is rising. The grape vines bled, which is a good and beautiful thing.

Nutrients and vitality pulsed from the ground below, priming each vine's vascular system, cleansing each pruning wound.

As our clay soil thaws and spring rains fall, our terrain will likely persist for some time in its sodden state. (Which is hardly surprising in our region of the world, where a massive clay bed fed the nation's leading paving brick industry, centered right here in Canton, Ohio.)

Canton paving bricks in autumn, a legacy of our terrain.

Days will arrive (soon, we hope) when bright sun will shine, and the temperature will rise above fifty.

On those days, our pruning cuts will gush, and we will delight, sure of Persephone's return.

Perhaps the earth did not cleave in our vineyard soil today.

But nonetheless, something new and vital rose from the earth below.

Perhaps it was not as dramatic as classical depictions of Persephone's return from exile in the underworld.

But for those of us who toil  routinely through seemingly changeless seasons, our reward is being present for subtle shifts in the status quo.

Today's pruning cuts were no different from thousands we made all winter.

Except that they WERE. 

They glowed, saturated with nectar arising from a wakening earth.

Frederic Leighton's Return of Persephone (1821)