沈丁花
Originally uploaded by nofrills.
In Japan, 沈丁花, or daphne is thought to be the floral messenger telling the arrival of spring. Their sweet scent fills the air and we think "Spring has come." We've had a warm winter this year, and the flowers come out early - at least ten days earlier, I think.
This one is on the street, beside a office building, and here I heard several elderly women say "It's spring, isn't it?", "Yes, it's warm and it's lovely, isn't it?" (「あら、もうすっかり春だわねえ」、「そうねえ、あったかくなっていいわねぇ」）
This sort of "seasonal messages from mother nature" is called 風物詩 [fuu butsu shi] along with seasonal festivals (human deeds). 詩 is "poetry", and there's a tradition behind this word - people used to write poems (haiku and waka) in their daily lives, citing some seasonal things.
