Saturday, September 1, 2018

A pleasant Autumn surprise!

The Better Half guided us this morning to several handsful (handfuls?) of wild aster plants growing in the woods in front of the house. We think they're Large-leaved aster (Eurybia macrophylla). Somehow either we never noticed them or had forgotten they were growing in that patch of woods. We now have an interesting transplant job ahead of us, especially because some of the plants are in enough shade (thanks to buckthorn) that they didn't develop flowers this year. Whether to undertake the operation this Autumn, or wait until the snow has melted and the ground thawed next Spring also requires some contemplation. [We're leaning toward Spring, but our impatience may win out.] If any of you reading this have experience with transplanting wildflowers and have advice to over, please do so. We're in a mode of checking the internet for guidance. This has us dealing with a number of inconsistencies and some outright conflicts in the advice provided. Time to drag out Samuel Beckett's incomparable aphorism "Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try Again. Fail again. Fail better."

asters in a September roadside
asters in a September roadside
Photo by J. Harrington


Lightness in Autumn



The rake is like a wand or fan,   
With bamboo springing in a span   
To catch the leaves that I amass   
In bushels on the evening grass.

I reckon how the wind behaves   
And rake them lightly into waves   
And rake the waves upon a pile,   
Then stop my raking for a while.

The sun is down, the air is blue,   
And soon the fingers will be, too,   
But there are children to appease   
With ducking in those leafy seas.

So loudly rummaging their bed
On the dry billows of the dead,
They are not warned at four and three   
Of natural mortality.

Before their supper they require   
A dragon field of yellow fire
To light and toast them in the gloom.   
So much for old earth’s ashen doom.



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