Aug 14, 2017 Original Poetry
Plant-Pride
©August 14th, 2017
By Vijaya Sundaram
I understand it’s all an accident,
This strange anomaly
Called Life; that things
Came to be from the endless
Intersections of unexpected events,
Careening towards each other,
And away from each other,
Leaving behind life or non-life.
And yet, when I plant seeds
And watch them grow,
Lush, and wild, brimful
Of sap and juice and leaves,
And see white and yellow flowers grow
Into baby squashes which promise
Sunshine and water and earth –
When I see my tomato plants, their
Green globes full of redness to come,
And my smooth, smug eggplants drooping
With sexy purple plumpness,
And my okra growing upright and perky,
Cradled in impossibly beautiful leaves,
And shy, small bitter gourd just starting out,
Emerging from their yellow flowers,
Protected by exquisite trailing leaves and vines,
Not yet scaly and hardened to all things–
When I see my bean-stalks climbing valiantly up
Their strings and poles, small white bean-flowers
Promising bright green beans-to-be –
Nestled among eaves still young
Still fat and rounded and green–
When I see a profusion of oregano,
Tall, spiky lemongrass, sweet lemon verbena,
And lemon balm growing madly, weed-like,
Spreading such verdant, vibrant,
Sun-saturated fragrance that I’m dizzy when I stoop
And inhale their scent –
When I see a bright vermilion rose bloom
In solitary beauty, and cheeky yellow roses nearby,
And delirious blue delphiniums (now sleeping),
And shy purple Jacob’s Ladder,
Pale purple and pink columbines,
And deep violet morning glories,
Growing everywhere, like a weed
Drunk on sunlight and soil and rain.
And many-hued echinacea flowers,
While bees hover, and butterflies zigzag
Drunken and delighted over them –
I feel within me
A swelling of pride,
A quickening of the blood,
A surge of emotion.
I did that, I think. I put those seeds
Into their seedling-pods, and later, into
The quiet, waiting earth prepared for them.
I sang to my seedlings, kissed them,
Watered them, weeded amongst them,
Agonized over their fate, and saw
Them shoot upwards, ready to give all.
Is it any wonder, then, that
Sometimes, for a fleeting instant,
I feel like the Goddess of all things,
Green and growing, in my garden?
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May 25, 2016 Daily Life, Ramblings and Musings, Uncategorized
Because I was, so to speak, knee-deep (not really, but it sounds better that way) in cow manure and compost and nice, fragrant earth, preparing beds for planting roses on one side, and planting peas and carrot seed in prepared beds on the other side of our hilly front yard. Last week, I’d planted bush beans and pole-beans in two prepared beds, but things got in the way, and I didn’t get to do more.
Preparing beds for planting vegetables is more back-breaking work than I’d realized. I mean I’ve done it only a few times before (my husband did it most of the time while I was teaching in school), and I’d forgotten how hard it is to turn the earth, to hoe and dig, and pull up deep-rooted weeds that spread under the top beds and add good, organic compost.
Until this year, I’ve tended to water, weed and harvest things from our garden , but hadn’t done the other hard work that is so pleasurable to do, and also so time-consuming. And of course, I planted lots of bulbs and small flowering plants and such in the fall, but somehow, that didn’t make me feel as tired as this work did (and that was tiring enough!)
This year, the garden is my responsibility from start to finish, it seems to me.
I love it.
This is my long explanation for why I haven’t done any real writing today. Well, another added reason was that I spent much of last night dealing with Holly, who had become violently sick from her vaccinations yesterday. After four or five hours of broken sleep, lots of cleanup and disinfecting, tending to sick dog, reassuring her, doing laundry, and so on, I was a wreck this morning. Then, the vet called (we’d left a message yesterday night), and said we could come in with Holly and have her looked at at 10:30 a.m.
I drove my poor, dehydrated darling to the vet, where I found she’d lost a whole pound in a single night. They gave her fluids, gave her anti-nausea meds, and she came home quite cheerfully. All fine for the rest of the day. I made her squishy rice with potato and apple, and added chicken broth to it. She ate like one starved. Later, she ate rice with yogurt at three separate times. I think she’s totally back to normal, although she did not touch her dry dog-food. The amount of worry and stress that my sick dog can generate in me surprises me. I fretted over her as if she were a baby of mine (well, she is).
Then came all that gardening I mentioned above. The sun beat down on me today, and I felt somewhat light-headed from all the work, the heat, the lack of sleep, and from my earlier worry about my dog. A big jar of lemonade, and a watermelon popsicle, and a long, soothing shower later, I was somewhat restored.
After that, we had to get ready to go and fete my husband’s brother’s son (okay, our nephew) who had just graduated from college. My father-in-law and step mom-in-law had generously offered to host us all to celebrate our nephew’s graduation. There were ten of us at the venue (my family, my brother-in-law’s family, my nephew’s maternal grandmother, and my father-in-law and his wife). It was a lovely evening, despite a long wait outside the restaurant, because all of us showed up a little late, and our table was taken. Still, it afforded us time to chat and be heard, which was harder once we were inside the restaurant. The food was good, and we managed to hear each other above the din. After a nice evening, we headed home to our ecstatic dog.
Once home, we hung out and listened to John Lee Hooker, Howlin’ Wolf and others singing the blues. Then, we sang 16th century madrigals as we do almost every night, and sent our daughter off to bed.
I still have chores, so many chores. I am tired.
But happy.
All is well.
I have nothing profound to say, for I’m profoundly tired.
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Tags: #DogWoes, #Family, #Gardening, #Graduation
Jul 6, 2014 Awake in Real Time: Coffee-induced Meditations and Journal Entries, Music, Parenting/ Home-schooling / Family Music and other Notes
Walked with Hol in the morning. She was sedate and heeled well — a nice change from the crazy persona she projected yesterday.
Read aloud two beautifully illustrated and entrancingly written graphic novels (one based on Athena and the other on Poseidon) to S after lunch. She was instantly captivated, and re-read them by herself again and again. She’s been deep into Greek Mythology since I bought her a few wonderfully engaging books on it a couple of years ago. She remembers things I don’t. It’s amazing. Her favorite goddess are Athena, Artemis, Demeter, Hestia and Metis. And I think she fell in love with the Theseus shown in the Poseidon book. She rather likes, and feels sorry for, Poseidon’s Cyclops son, Polyphemus. She LOVED the three Fates show in the Athena book. Good taste!
Lots of planting in the evening. Very nice. Found a bunny in the garden, which appeared suddenly out of tall grasses, and sprang away into the hostas on the side. S helped with weeding.
Hol’s busy chewing on a water bottle. Got to rescue it.
Went up for a bit and listened to S practising guitar, improvising on a D minor scale, while Warren played the chords. Lovely! Holly listened to her, and then to us, when we sang a Beatles song together. She likes music, just as we all do.
Tags: #Dog, #Gardening, #Journal Entry, Family time with daughter, husband, Lazy Sunday