An Exuberant Song

 Many thanks to Magaly Guerrero for hosting this fantastic blog party. We need more magic in the world and too often it's the small quiet wonders that have vanished before some of us even knew they were there.

I have a garden and it has a purpose bigger than me. It's not a veggie garden or a tidy flower border or trimmed topiaries. Those kinds of gardens are all wonderful, but it isn't what was intended in this place. This garden, my garden, is a crazy, haphazard, joyful mix of echinacea, anemones, salvia, lavender, roses, foxglove, mallow and butterfly bushes. It has at least a dozen herbs scattered through it. Sweet woodruff, lemon thyme, sage, dill and many more.
   Every fall the witch-hazel is full of praying mantis nests. I've come out the door a bit too fast and startled two dozen or more yellow finches feasting off the tops of the echinacea cones. They flew off in a whir of golden wings.
The garden is a circus of hummingbirds, butterflies and bees.
There are jewel-colored beetles that I have no names for and some very pretty spiders. (not my favorites, but I have found if I don't quarrel with them they generally leave me alone)
This particular garden is a lure, a siren singing an exuberant song.
It's melody is in it's scents and colors, the swaying stems of sunflowers, the plop of rain on leaves. The droning of insects in the summer sun. It's singing, 'come here, you are safe, you are welcome. There are no poisons, no death to carry back to your hives and your nests. There is enough for all. Be welcome, be safe. Rest awhile. Return. There is plenty.

I made this doll as a kind of representation of the garden and how I see it's abundance spilling over, protecting and nurturing the small living things that come to it and need it so.

 

Thank you for stopping by. I hope you enjoy the rest of the wonderful offerings!