May 22 - May 26 The Force That Through the Green Fuse...

2010-I love the dandelion plant.  Alongside the driveway, left un-mowed, they are now at least a foot high, fully seeded out and gradually releasing their little airships to the wind.  I think it is through their usefulness that I have come to appreciate them, but it is their striking robust vigor I’m appreciating now. Is it the intensity of their energy shining through the form that makes them seem so beautiful?  By the way, dandelion flowers dredged in a mix of corn meal and chili powder, then fried in olive oil, are absolutely delicious. 
I love robins as well. With their plump rusty breasts, hopping gait and beady black eyes, they seem the very emblem of cheerful curiosity as they scrabble around throwing up leaves and uncovering fat worms.  Has anyone ever seen a thin, depressed robin?  How fortunate I feel to take such pleasure in these common things. 
2011- Because of the continuing rain and the scoring job, I was unable to keep up with mowing and things got out of hand; the lawn became a meadow and how beautiful the seeding dandelion stalks looked!  Not to mention the birds enjoyed them immensely. One day I watched a rabbit suck in a dandelion stalk like a strand of spaghetti. Finally able to begin the lawn mower assault, I hesitated at the sight of so many different kinds of wild flowers ready to bloom, but I know from the areas that I have let go to meadow, the grasses, in one season, take over pretty much everything else.
The wet, cloudy, cool weather continues almost without a break day after day. Even when it isn’t actually raining the mist is so thick you end up soaking wet anyway. The plants seem to love it, growing in jungle like thickness but the lilac flowers that bloomed so heavily and profusely quickly rotted on their stems. I can’t put in the hot weather things I started, or even put them outside for more light and they are stunted and pale. it’s a pity and I don’t think they will be able to recover.  I might re-start some directly from seed if it ever warms up, but they will be so far behind.

The distant chainsaw               
And the hummingbirds’ buzz prune            
This May miasma.


Only the tangled shrubbery's
Need of shears motivates me.

2012-The wild roses are beginning but as I walked around the yard burying my face in the opening buds, I realized it was queerly silent. They should be vibrating with the buzzing of bees but I could find only one-a bumblebee. There were some honeybees in the crocuses earlier this spring and I felt hopeful, but today--not one. How can this be? What does it mean? Is it Silent Spring? The ash tree-the centerpiece of the yard, the only shade in summer-appears to be dying as well. Emerald ash borer? A disease it’s seemed to have on and off for years? A hummingbird habitually sits on one of its bare little twigs-today even it is gone.
2013-Amazingly, a few of the pumpkin plants have survived the frost, (after being turned to slime all the way back to the first leaf node) shooting out new leaves with a vengeance. Yesterday one actually produced a flower. The apple trees and the nectarine seem unharmed as well, and covered with tiny green fruits.