I’ve been obsessed with plants that open and close recently (or more properly, nyctinasty). My new baby passion flower for example seems shy about its own beauty.
Until ta-da, when I’m not looking…
Ridiculously splendid! And on a writing residency in Suffolk, I even began saying good night and good morning to the plants in my little cowslip filled garden…
It reminds me of a lovely family holiday in Carcassonne two years ago for my niece’s wedding, and watching the sunflowers turn their heads towards the sun. How hard it is not to give them all personalities.
And also also not to see some significance to the current joyful spread of the little purple plant, self-heal. With its blue and purple colour and connection to the throat chakra (helping us to all to speak up) surely it’s what we all need more than ever at the moment. Here’s my friend, Marian, a true friend to the earth, picking some in her garden. She’s the one who told me to look out for it, and now I see it everywhere:
There’s no poem about this today. I am actually working on it but after flowing for a couple of lines, it’s ended up being more of a battle than usual. I’ve shut myself up! Perhaps I need more self-heal to strengthen my throat, but in the meantime here are the names (from the RHS website) for this little powerful ‘weed’, surely a poem in themselves:
heal-all all-heal blue curls blue Lucy brownwort brunel caravaun bog carpenter grass carpenter’s herb carpenter’s square heart of the earth herb carpenter Hercules’ all-heal hook-heal hookweed panay proud carpenter sickle-heal sicklewort slough-heal square stem thimble flower
Heart of the earth – how beautiful is that?
It reminds me of one of my favourite quotes, from the writer, Anais Nin:
“And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.”
Lastly, a reminder, if you are interested in writing in the garden, that I put up my first creative writing prompt on Wednesday. Hopefully it’ll become a regular thing. Do make yourself a tea, get a snack, find a bit of space and join in over the weekend!
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