Flimmering larkspur blue

Poetry. What would the world be like if we didn’t have poets to bring us words such as “flimmering”?

Flimmering: A flickering glimmer.

Carl Sandburg wrote of the “gold of the southwest moon” and “Canada thistle blue and flimmering larkspur blue.” As I scattered larkspur seeds about my garden months ago – a little here, a little there, quite a few over there – never did I imagine that I would today write about flimmering larkspur blue. Nor did I ever imagine that a garden visitor would paint me – Me! – a picture of my larkspur blue.

In some ways, this story begins a year ago April. Or maybe it began nearly twenty years ago when I first stumbled upon the children’s book Miss Rumphius. Either way, let’s begin in April, 2022.

The garden club I have long been a member of was in need of someone to coordinate tours of the club members’ gardens. “I’ll do it!” I found myself saying, eagerly thinking ahead to the many wonderful garden tours I might arrange. Then summer hit. That would be the summer of 2022. The one that will live on as one of the hottest and driest on record for North Texas. The one that saw temperatures of 108 degrees. As if that wasn’t bad enough, the summer was hot on the heels of Snowmageddon 2021.

Snow. Sleet. Freezing rain. Oh, by the end of it, we all knew the difference between the three forms of wet stuff that fell from the sky. And lingered. Because not only were we covered in a sheet of ice, we had record low temperatures, which meant the frozen stuff stayed around. For days and days on end. Now for the gardener, a deep freeze means potentially losing tender vegetation. And ice – while it can provide a layer of protection against the cold – tends to break tree branches and split shrubs in two and all around wreck havoc on the landscape.

Which brings me back to…. arranging garden tours.

“Ask me again in the spring, when the garden has had a chance to recover,” was the answer I heard time and time again. Fair enough. Summer was brutal. We all needed time to recover.

Then came December. Which opened with a rare winter tornado and closed with yet another – though less icy – deep freeze. Nine degrees, so soon after endless days above 100 degrees, added more losses to the garden tally sheet.

If our gardens looked a bit weary and beaten down, who could blame them? They had been through a literal hell (summer), bookended by the two extreme cold events. The only saving grace – weather such as we have experienced of late creates space for renewal and renovation. And. Buying new plants, amiright?

I decided this was my chance to be brave. To look at the stump of my 25 year old bay laurel tree – once as tall as our roof – and to see the potential in the fresh, tender new growth slowly emerging at the base. We gardeners are an optimistic bunch, aren’t we? We scatter seeds, in hopes that flowers will emerge. We can look at what once was and not be sad that it is now gone, but see the promise that is emerging.

In many ways, that has been my gardening life the past few years. Gone are the roses, destroyed by rose rosette virus. A new garden has grown out of the ashes. Was it ready now for prime time? Could I be brave and open up my garden to the garden club? I don’t garden by the rules so there is always the fear: Could others appreciate what I had created? The last time my garden was on a tour was two decades ago. Yes. 2-0 years ago. It was time – perhaps past time – to allow others to see the new garden.

It was a beautiful day. Just the sort of flimmering larkspur blue day that Sandburg had written about. To the best of my knowledge, no one has ever penned a poem about my garden. But I now have something far better than a poem, for one of my garden visitors painted a picture of my garden.

My garden. Painted!

With my flimmering larkspur blue and my southwest moon gold primrose.

Sandburg also wrote about crying over beautiful things, “knowing no beautiful thing lasts.” Beautiful things may not last. The larkspur are now fading away as the temperatures inch upward. The painting, hopefully, will last forever. And – yes – I cried when I opened the envelope that landed in my mailbox a few days after the garden tour. The painting of my garden. Truly, I have never received such a thoughtful and heartwarming gift as that painting.

Larkspur was one of the first annuals I planted when I first broke ground 28 years ago. For years, they returned like clockwork, until the antique roses overfilled the flower beds and squeezed out the larkspur. Miss Rumphius is the fictionalized story of Hilda Hamlin, The Lupine Lady, who sowed lupine seeds along the Maine coast. In Barbara Cooney’s book, Miss Rumphius is told by her grandfather to find a way to make the world a more beautiful place, which she does by scattering lupine seeds. Lupines are not fond of our Texas weather but larkspur is just as beautiful and just as flimmering blue.

The variety I grew this year is Giant Imperial Larkspur. And giant it was, with many reaching five feet tall. I am currently saving seed to sow again next year in my garden and to share with the garden club. And perhaps, like Miss Rumphius, to sow about the town.