MinxterBLOOM

I fell asleep during key moments of last weeks -- and this -- week's PBS Masterpiece version of Tess of the d'Urbervilles. I cannot decide if I like it or not.  More on that, perhaps, later.  I do appreciate that the filim sets nearly everthing OUTSIDE, in nature.  That truly reflects Hardy.  The scenes are gorgeous, including one of Tess on a veranda, forelorn, after telling Angel  her secret.  The stone floor is rich with tufts growing between the pavers.  I wanted to ask Tess to move aside and for the camera to zoom in and down.

"Steppables" is the post modern way to say it:  plants that grow up from the crannies and permit walking of some sort.

My favorite such scene that I lived in, circa 1991, featured Shirley poppies reseeding themselves in an old brick patio my brother helped me built.  I do toss seed and sand upon and near my current brick pathway but to date, no darling Shirley lodges and grows.  Goodness knows I have the crannies and crevices.

Catch the first episode of Tess here, conveniently arranged in "chapters."

Note:  Click into the Joseph Dougherty photo to see more information about Papaver rhoes.  I appreciate the directions on posting this photo there.  The request is for thumbnail only, unless for academic purposes.  The plant photos database at UCAL Berkeley is among the best. Don't miss the landscape subset here.  Plants in situ, which is as they should be.

but until then, this snowdrop gallery is a feast. The webmaster is a Galanthus-phile who lives, I believe in Antrim at Colesbourne.  Colesbourne Park is home to a floribundant collection of snowdrops, open to the public on many occasions. The collection was built up by members of the Elwes family. 

I always think of two literature bits when i see snowdrops.

Neil Gaiman's  Stardust father and son, Dunstan and Tristan, carry a glass snowdrop that chimes.  See this entry in Neil's journal where he remembers his "snowdrops resolutions.  I like this name more than New Year's promises.

Seamus Heaney's poem is a response to the death of his baby brother Christopher.

Mid-Term Break

I sat all morning in the college sick bay
Counting bells knelling classes to a close.
At ten o'clock our neighbours drove me home.

In the porch I met my father crying -
He had always taken funerals in his stride -
And Big Jim Evans saying it was a hard blow.

The baby cooed and laughed and rocked the pram 
When I came in, and I was embarrassed 
By old men standing up to shake my hand 

And tell me they were 'sorry for my trouble' 
Whispers informed strangers that I was the eldest, 
Away at school, as my mother held my hand 

In hers and coughed out angry tearless sighs. 
At ten o'clock the ambulance arrived 
With the corpse, stanched and bandaged by the nurses. 

Next morning I went up into the room. Snowdrops 
And candles soothed the bedside I saw him 
For the first time in six weeks. Paler now, 

Wearing a poppy bruise on his left temple. 
He lay in a four foot box, as in his cot. 
No gaudy scars, the bumper knocked him clear. 

A four foot box, a foot for every year. 

I admit that this is hard.  However, the range of online seed vendor options means that I can browse without the environmental burden of yet another dead tree count.

I plan to grow sweet peas this spring.  In 1996, I grew them to fair success.  Henry Mitchell writes lovingly and practically about growing these cool-preferring darlings.  I am tempted to buy two plants from Annie's Annuals and set them out in my bunny-poo prep spot.. Read about this dream here. Poetic bit there, too, should you need tempting.  Too bad the internet does not yet include a scratch- and-sniff option.

Chiltern Seeds online includes a detailed entry on the classic progenitor of the range of sweet pea strains:  Lathryus odoratus "Cupani." Behnke's, local family-owned nursery in Beltsville, MD, used to carry Chiltern packets in a range of varieties.  This year, not so.  I may order from this energetic little company, J.Hudsons, seedman, in Northern California.  Look here for "wild Italian" strain of annual sweet peas.

Ed Bisese is a DC artist and landscape architect.  His comic works are droll, bizarre, and highly graphic.  This installation is quite fun -- and ominous.

Read more here, at the Wave Hill site.  I do not think the portal to Fractured Fairyland is still there. I will let you know. Do you know of other improbable garden art installations?  Let me know. We can post them.

Search on flower terms.  For example, peony revealed this set of colors:

 Daffodil was associated with this: