Carl Sandburg

Just Before April Came

Just Before April Came - meaning Summary

Spring Presence in Small Lives

Sandburg’s short poem records a close, sensory scene of late winter turning to spring: melting snow, shining pools, playful birds, frogs calling, a spider testing webs, and a bug grooming. The speaker catalogs small animal gestures and then asks who they are, prompting a quiet wonder at the liveliness and personhood of ordinary creatures and the sudden recognition of communal life returning with the season.

Read Complete Analyses

THE SNOW piles in dark places are gone. Pools by the railroad tracks shine clear. The gravel of all shallow places shines. A white pigeon reels and somersaults. Frogs plutter and squdge-and frogs beat the air with a recurring thin steel sliver of melody. Crows go in fives and tens; they march their black feathers past a blue pool; they celebrate an old festival. A spider is trying his webs, a pink bug sits on my hand washing his forelegs. I might ask: Who are these people?

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