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A Photo of Phlox

A Photo of Phlox

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Waking from brief sleep, I make some tea and slowly come alive. We’ve moved from summer back to spring. The first birds are stirring. It’s the hour before dawn, when the day is just a hint on the horizon.

Soon I will drive in the gloaming past the shimmering azaleas, the fading dogwood. I will, in my haste, not have time to look, to really see, what I am passing.

But on an earlier day I have let the camera look for me. Here, on our normally sedate corner, a vivid crop of creeping phlox.

The Birth of a Fern

The Birth of a Fern

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It emerges not as a shoot but as a tendril. Furry and curved, something prehistoric, of the grave. One does not ooh and aah over the baby fern. One is curious, to be sure. And circumspect. A bit in awe. But not giddy or giggle-prone. Adorable the young fern is not.

But as it grows, it comes into its own. It unfurls, straightens out, becomes the plant it was meant to be. Lacey and delicate. At once contemporary and old-fashioned. Ferns give me faith.

Virginia Bluebells

Virginia Bluebells

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I know where to find them, walked right to them on Friday, crossed Soapstone, turned left onto a springy woods trail and there they were. Early, of course. But then everything is early this year.

Tall, nodding flowers, pink as buds and becoming a heavenly blue in maturity. A blue edging toward periwinkle. A color seen less often this time of year, so dominated are we by yellows, pinks and purples.

The Virginia bluebell thrives in woodland soil, rich, loamy, leaf-strewn. There are few of these wildflowers in our woods. Which makes seeing them each spring all the more essential. I make my way to their home as if visiting a national monument or a famous painting. It’s one of my rites of spring.

Photo: Bellewood Gardens.com

The Aroma of Hyacinth…

The Aroma of Hyacinth…

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Is what remains of Easter. A whiff of a flower that droops upon its stem; that bends, heavy with fragrance and with blossom. This one is lavender, the color of regret.

A brief holiday is over. The world is still light with the new green of spring, but duty makes it feel heavy. The birds are calling and the azaleas flash pink along the walkway. The tulips arch toward the sun. I pick up where I left off. I begin again.

I keep the hyacinth by the kitchen window, where I can savor it often.

Refilled

Refilled

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Last night, a stroll through the spring twilight. The street was quiet; only a few last-minute mulchers still covering their garden beds. (Tonight we will be covering tender plants against the predicted freeze.) To the west, the sky was streaks of brightness and a smudged contrail. To the east, a gathering darkness. In every direction, a softness born of moist soil and budding trees.

Tulips are up, dogwood is blooming and Bradford pears waning. The Kwanzan cherry in our front yard has erupted with its double pink blossoms like big greedy fists.

What was stark and monochromatic has become pliable and pastel. I left an empty vessel, and with every step I was refilled.

My Heart With Pleasure Fills

My Heart With Pleasure Fills

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I’m thinking of that poem, the one we learned in elementary school, the one that seems jaded and obvious — until you stumble upon it in real time.

The other day I rounded the corner of a paved path and there was my own “host of golden daffodils.”

Or not my own, actually. That was the beauty of it. They were for everyone, were wild and free, glorifying not just a single backyard but a widespread and well traveled community woods. Tucked among the oaks and maples and just a few feet away from the skunk cabbage.

I slowed my pace as I strode beside them, wanting to savor their beauty as long as possible. Other amblers did the same that sweet spring morning. There was a hush in the air, a reverence for the blossoms.

I did not wait for “the inward eye, which is the bliss of solitude.” I took no chances. I used a camera. And now, as I look at the photograph, I remember the flowers’ surprising presence in that parceled suburban landscape. The words flow into my mind before I can stop them: “And then my heart with pleasure fills, and dances with the daffodils.”

Daffodils in February

Daffodils in February

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Someone I know is about to travel to a faraway country. It will be cold there, she said, so she’s taking lots of warm clothes.

For a minute this confused me. Warm clothes? Winter? I had almost forgotten them.

Yesterday our daffodils finally bloomed. Finally is a funny word to use about spring at the end of February. But the buds have been full to bursting for a couple of weeks now. So “finally” is what it feels like.

I want to protect these early flowers, the frost-nipped tulip tree, the shy, early-blooming cherry. But all I can do is watch and hope. The daffodils are sturdy, though, so I have more confidence in them. Which also means more joy.

Bringing the Outside In

Bringing the Outside In

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A friend at work is retiring and yesterday she gave me her plants, a small begonia and a Christmas cactus. These join my anemic spider plants and seen-better-days African violet on a table (another bequeath) in front of the alley-view window.

My office now has cleaner air and slightly softer outlines. It has a bit of the jungle about it. It will be nice next week to be greeted not just by a spot of green but by a veritable wall of it. There’s something about bringing the outside in that does a heart good.

And speaking of that, I am in search of a cyclamen for the holidays. If it is even half as profuse and lovely as last year’s, we will be in good shape.

Ghost Flowers

Ghost Flowers

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I can’t walk far these days without seeing one of late summer’s most luscious treats. It is Clematis paniculata, sweet autumn clematis.

Paniculata — what a wonderful word! I say it silently to myself when I’m walking and I swear it speeds me up. It has multisyllabic bounciness. It reminds me, in fact, of another multisyllabic word, Lolita, and of the opening lines of Nabokov’s novel by that name: “Lo-lee-ta: the tip of the tongue taking a trip of three steps down the palate to tap, at three, on the teeth. Lo. Lee. Ta.”

Only with “paniculata” that would be five steps down the palate — Pa. Nic. U. La. Ta.”

Paniculata is a spray of white in a world of tired green. It is a bridal veil, a fountain, a bounty; climbing over fence rows and crowning mailboxes. We had one for many years and then it mysteriously disappeared. A victim of disease or an errant mower? We’ll never know.

Every year I vow to plant another. But every year I forget. Clematis paniculata. Ghost flowers.


Photo: White Flower Farm

Both Sides

Both Sides

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On a walk down the West Ox path today, one stretch was lined with wild chickory, the blue flowers nodding over the path, almost crowding me out. I felt like I was strolling along a flower-strewn walk in an English country garden. The wild plants will do that to you, will mimic, with their colors and arrangement, the artlessness of the planned landscape.

But then again, some designed landscapes, Central Park, for example, are a controlled version of nature with stream, foliage and vista. Makes me think we need a little of both — wild and free; prim and controlled — in our gardens and in our lives.