On Friday I realized I was depressed. It was a relief really, when that little flash of insight came: This is depression. Right, I thought, it’s February. Something about the sameness, the grayness, the endless-ness does me in each year. Winter just seems so true, and Spring seems like a fairytale. What I have to remember, of course, is that fairytales are true too.

So I found myself on Friday afternoon reminding myself that Spring is an actual season that happens. The days lengthen, winter’s dull skies lighten, trees bud, and daffodils really do emerge from the mud.

I wrote this poem during a very bad winter years ago now, and it perfectly conveys my current status quo—the one where it’s hard to believe anything will ever change.

Evidence Unseen
The ground froze hard that year
and remained unyielding beneath the snow
geological layers of unrelenting storms

The sun was forgotten
lost behind a mask of palest gray
Heaven’s shutters locked
against all hope and prayers

I didn’t even know about the bulbs
hushed and waiting
daffodils and hyacinth
biding time in the dark and frozen earth

Right now I am holding onto this hope in what I do not see—that somewhere out ahead of me, Spring will come, and bulbs I didn’t even plant will bloom.