Ode to a garden of:
Early Spring makes me angsty. Yes. I know – I’m an odd duck. But all those fluffy bunnies and frilly trees and easter eggs, and brand new not-even-quite-green-green, it irritates me. And then comes the 2nd week in April and everything takes a turn. The green goes true. The rose bushes fill out and start to puff up their breasts and the rains have started to really mean it.
My two Old English Roses are blooming. And they make my heart sing in both fragrance and their diminutive size. Crocus Rose & Abraham Darby.
And then there are the Irises. This one is Champagne Elegance. Love flower names. Like it’s sister, Superstition. She hasn’t bloomed yet. I predict tomorrow.
The neighbor littles playing with ants on the peony bush. First thing I planted alongside my Salem Rosemary when I moved in. Roots. So many flower thoughts and silly little opinions. The first years were hard and unsure and shy and I knew nothing other than what I loved and I threw them in the ground and closed my eyes real tight.
And now they’re burgeoning. Taking over. Winding their tendrils around my heart. Even the ones that were supposed to be annuals. They annually come back. And grow brighter. Larger. Louder. Unconstrained.
But any seasoned gardener will tell you that in order to truly love the patch of earth you tend, you have to be willing to cut. Cut back the rose bushes. Cut back the Bluebeard and the rust-leaved hollyhocks. Weed out the wild violets you thought were so charming, before you learned they mightily take over Everything.
And once you do, you find that limping-along-lilac that is over 60 years old – it comes back to spring like a viral lass. Triumphant that you learned. What it needed.
