Wax poetic on the cherry blossoms The Jefferson Memorial seems to glow among the blossoms just after sunset at the Tidal Basin. (Astrid Riecken for The Washington Post) Today's warm weather is a sure sign of one thing: D.C."s famous cherry trees will be blooming soon. The National Cherry Blossom Festival begins March 20. In honor of the humble flower, we want you to send in haikus (the three-line poems that have five syllables in the first, seven in the second and five in the third). The author of the winning verse receives a gorgeous new coffee table book, "Cherry Blossoms," the official book of the National Cherry Blossom Festival. Submit your odes in the comments below and recommend other readers" poems that you like. Or you can tweet your poems to @goingoutguide with hashtag #blossomhaiku. Here are a couple of past reader submissions and some fun old photos to get you in the spirit: Delicate cherries Cotton candy for the soul Winters comfort bloom On tiptoe I spy Softest snow of pink and white Watch it! That's my foot! Camera bugs snap the cherry blossoms on the Tidal Basin in May 1941. Martha McMillan Roberts/Library of Congress Four debutantes walk under the blossoms at the Tidal Basin circa 1920. National Photography Collection/Library of Congress