More Thoughts From The Garden

Perhaps I should just rename this blog "Garden Thoughts."  As those seem to be just about the only thoughts I have nowadays.  I used to think about my classes, lesson plans, student problems, stuff like that.  For many years I thought about those things.  Of course, as always, I do think about things like the stupidity of  the cranky right wing, Wall Street, Timothy Geitner, et al's objections to putting Elizabeth Warren in as head of the newly formed Consumer Financial Protection Board, the latest blatant lies and deception of those monsters running British Petroleum, the fact that this is on track to be the hottest year since anyone's been keeping track and that we're unlikely to see any sort of effective legislation to control climate change getting passed in my lifetime - stuff like that, yes.  But really, during the active hours of the day, before it gets close to one hundred degrees in my yard, most of my thoughts have to do with what is living, even perhaps thriving, what looking droopy and discouraged, what could go in that empty space right over there, why the tithonia seeds I planted turned up their toes and croaked soon after sprouting (when last year the same plants, grown from seed, were the stars of my late summer garden), will I be able to find any aster plants to put in for fall?  And many more ruminations in a similar vein.  Actually, most of the time my thoughts are with the possibility that it is never going to rain again here in the NE quadrant of the city of Albuquerque.

Well, I began this post two days ago, and am just now getting back to it.  Still hasn't rained here, though a friend on the outskirts of Grants up on the toes of Mt. Taylor reports a lovely "plant-loving" steady rain last night.  So I guess, I'll go out and water for a while, continuing to wait and hope.  Because I am watering, and feeling bad - but not as bad as the city golf course mangers should feel, at using water for this purpose, things actually aren't looking too bad.  The sunflowers everywhere cheer me up every morning, the roses are finishing up their second bloom, all the sedums are happy as pigs in mud - I'm thinking of just sedums next summer, forget anything else.  Okay, as many kinds of sunflowers and sages as I can manage as well.  Also going to research native grasses, the tall waving kinds, for several places.

Poem A Day Challenge, Day 2

It's pretty unlikely that I'll be able to keep up with this challenge as the month proceeds.  Right now I'm Home Alone on a long holiday weekend, with nothing much else to do but keep the home fires burning, read, noodle around on the internet....and write poetry. Real Life will return with a vengeance all too soon. So I'm taking advantage of this time to do this writing.  And already I'm a day behind!!  Yesterday's prompt was "water," something that I think about a lot here in this dry land.  I've written several responses to this prompt, but this is the one I think I'll keep.  The subject of this poem, BTW, is a real place.  See it here.

Leonora Curtin Wetland Preserve

It hasn’t rained for months.
The Santa Ana winds
Are blowing dust and grit
Into every pore and cranny
of furniture and skin.
The mountains
have been invisible for days,
cloaked in wind and dust.
My lettuce seedlings in the backyard struggle,
 need water twice a day.

Yet I know, not far away
there is a miracle,
a place for rehydration of my
dried out desert soul.
Pocket wetland,  eye of water,
waving cattails, lily pads.
rushes, reeds and ferns.
All the thirsty green things
find home and shelter here.
Even in the hottest days of summer
 the air is damp and green,
 alive with forbs and flowers, nodding willows,
butterflies and birds.
Bullfrogs wallow in the shallows
at the edges of the pond,
bask on rafts of rotted vegetation,
under hovering damselflies.
High desert miracle of hidden wetland,
 watercress and cactus side by side.

A Walk In The Park

One of the conclusions drawn from the research I wrote about a couple of days ago, was that we'd all feel better more, and be better people, if we got out and took a walk more often.  I walk for exercise as close to daily as possible, most often on the mean streets of my city.  But that's not what the article meant.  It meant get out into the trees, the wildflowers, the birds, in other words, Nature. I had no classes yesterday, and after working in the house (laundry, getting a strata ready to bake for supper) all morning, I really wanted out into the emerging sunshine.  It's been so cold and grey, so unlike New Mexico, that I just haven't been inspired to make an effort to find good places to walk. 

Although the sun was shining, it was still quite cold, and I wanted someplace I could enjoy the bounty of Nature, yet have someplace to warm up if I really couldn't take the cold wind.  And, in fact, I was inspired.  I thought of the Albuquerque Biopark, a facility that comprises the Zoo, the Aquarium, and a wonderful  Botanic Garden.  I did some errands along the way, and arrived at the Biopark about three - only to find, to my horror, that it had been invaded by hordes of people and equipment filming for the TV show In Plain Sight. Once I got through the active filming area and into the gardens, I was almost the only human out walking the paths on this cold sunny day.  So I walked for over an hour, visiting the Curandera Garden, the Desert Garden, the Heritage Gardens, and a long time in the Japanese Gardens.

When I got too cold, and wanted to see some blooming plant life, I went into one of the glasshouses, full of green, and brightly blooming, tropical plants.  I couldn't stay long, because my cold glasses fogged up ferociously and I soon became much too warm. It was either take off many layers of clothing or head back out into the cold.  I did another tour of the Japanese Gardens, the newest feature of the Biopark, and a place of such tranquillity.  These gardens are full of water features, the sound of falling, rippling water everywhere, the sight and smell of water a boon to my dehydrated desert soul. I meandered back by the big pond in the middle of the park, where wood ducks and mallards were having a wonderful time, a few mothers with strollers were sitting on the rocks letting their children enjoy the birds and the water.  Despite having to thread my way through the filming business again on my way out to the parking lot, I left feeling like I'd had a brief vacation, from daily life and chores.  It's so easy and close, I need to remember to get back there more often.
(More photos from the Biopark on my Flickr photo storage site.)