Somebody threw away the pea sticks which I had carefully collected. There is nothing better than small branches pruned or fallen from trees for garden peas to climb over. Fortunately rough winds have shaken the darling buds of May, and sticks blown down from various trees are scattered beneath them. The Lord taketh away and the Lord giveth. I wander about like a medieval peasant gathering the bounty. The pea plants are waiting in the greenhouse. I have given up planting the seeds where they will eventually grow. Too often the seeds have been eaten by mice, or so I am told.
I sit in the sun and listen to the wind. Above me the branches of the lime tree swing in the wind as through trying to work loose. The bracts of the winged seeds ( I suppose the tree's fruit) are already in evidence. Their cream-colour contrasts with the fresh green of the leaves. In the wind the leaves and bracts tremble in constant movement. In a space between them I can just see the white breast of a pigeon. The pigeon amid all this movement is quite still.
2 comments:
I learned a new word today for those winged seeds: samara. I subscribe to a daily word newsletter from Webster Dictionary, and that was today's word.
Thank you Martha. That's fascinating. Quite new to me too. I have just looked up samara in a couple of dictionaries. The Shorter Oxford traces the word back to 1577. The more I think about it, it is a rather beautiful word and seems appropriate to describe such cunningly sculpted fruit. I shall use it.
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