"As kingfishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame; / [ . . . ] Each mortal thing does one thing and the same: / Deals out that being indoors each one dwells; / Selves -- goes itself; 'myself' it speaks and spells, / Crying 'What I do is me; for that I came'." --Gerard Manley Hopkins

27 March 2007

Bursting into Bloom

Another lovely spring surrounds us here. Last year the forsythia blinded us with its sun-like brilliance. This year it seems subdued beside the richness of the redbuds.

Saturday when I went to check the mail, the gentle white of the thickly flowered dogwood overwhelmed our front yard with beauty. A little later, my husband came into the study and wandered over to the window.

"When did that happen?" he asked in surprise.

"When did what happen?" I replied with my usual astuteness, swimming up to consciousness from Arthur C. Clarke's Songs of Distant Earth.

"When did the dogwood bloom? I've never seen it that full. It wasn't like that when I went out this morning."

A few moments later he remembered that he had watered it while caring for the lawn in the unusual dry spell we've been enduring. "It must have needed just that little bit of moisture for the buds to burst open."

Amazing things happen when one simply goes about doing one's job.

2 comments:

GrumpyTeacher1 said...

A wise observation

St. Kevin & the Blackbird said...

Things are starting warm up here too. Crocuses mostly, and tulip shoots. We're gettin' into Hopkins dappled time! I love it.

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