As we have learned over the centuries, when it comes to burning witches, it doesn’t really matter if you have burned a real witch or just someone who, in your fevered, partisan, and paranoid imagination, could easily become a witch in the future. It is the burning that is the message.
Recent daytime skies have reflected bracing ice blues over frozen landscapes and, alternately, soft vernal overtones during thaws. As the Sun arcs higher in the sky, we feel the pull toward spring.
In the absence of protective and nourishing snow and sustained freezing weather, it seems arbitrary to proceed as if there’s been winter and to accept that we are halfway to spring.