Plant Sightings

Welcome back to Flower Poetry Fridays with Mrs. Sigourney. Each Friday a new poem will be posted from her The Voice Of Flowers.

PLANTING GERANIUM AND BOX
ON THE GRAVE OF AN AGED FRIEND.*

FRAGILE plant, of slender form,
Fair, and shrinking from the storm,
Raise thou here, thy timid head,
Bloom in this uncultur’d bed :
Thou, of firmer spirit, too,
Stronger texture, deeper hue,
Dreading not the blasts that sweep,
Rise, and guard its infant sleep.

Fear ye not the lonely shade
Where the bones of men are laid ;
Short, like yours, their transient date, —
Keen hath been the scythe of fate.
Forth, like plants, in glory drest,
They came upon the green earth’s breast,
Spread forth their roots to reach the stream, —
Their blossoms, toward the rising beam,
Inhal’d the morning’s balmy breath,
And sank at eve, in withering death.
Rest here, meek plants, for few intrude
To break this silent solitude.

Yet should some giddy footstep tread
Amid the ashes of the dead,
Still let the hand of rashness spare
These tokens of affection’s care,
Nor pluck their cherish’d buds that wave,
In sweetness o’er a Christian’s grave.
— White were the locks that thinly spread
Their silver o’er her honor’d head,
And furrows, not to be effaced,
Had time amid her features traced,
Before my earliest strength I tried
In infant gambols by her side ;
But yet, no grace or beauty rare,
Were ever to my eye so fair.

Seven times the sun with swift career,
Hath marked the circle of the year,
Since first she pressed her lowly bier ;
And seven times sorrowing have I come
Alone and wandering through the gloom,
To pour my lays upon her tomb ;
Nor could I bear to see her bed
With brambles and with thorns o’er spread.

Ah ! surely round her place of rest
I should not let the coarse weed twine,
Who every path by sorrow prest,
With pure benevolence hath blest,
And scattered such perfumes on mine ;
It is not meet, that she should be
Forgotten, or unwept by me.

My plants, that in your hallowed beds,
Like strangers, raise your trembling heads,
Drink the pure dew that evening sheds,
And meet the morning’s earliest ray,
And catch the sunbeams when they play ;
And if your cups are filled with rain,
Shed back those drops in tears again ;
Or if the gale that sweeps the heath,
Too roughly o’er your leaves should breathe,
Then sigh for her, and when ye bloom,
Scatter your fragrance o’er her tomb.

But should ye, smit with terror, cast
Your blighted blossoms on the blast,
Or faint beneath the vertic heat,
Or fail when wintry tempests beat,
There is a plant of deeper bloom,
Whose leaves shall deck this honor’d tomb,
Not blanch’d with frost, or parch’d for rain,
Or by the wrath of winter slain,
But every morn its buds renewed,
Are by the tears of evening dewed,
— The deathless plant of gratitude.

* This tribute to the memory of a kind benefactress of
childhood, though written in early years, seemed not inappro-
priate to the present selection.

We leave offerings to those who have passed before us in the way of flower bouquets, favorite foods, gifts, and even small stones — depending on your upbringing.

It must be a very sacred and timeless thing to plant a flower on an old friend’s grave. Sorrow and tears at the grave can be replaced with good memories as one beautifies the grave with a lovely flower or bouquet.

With the vines and brambles removed from around the grave, a pretty flower was planted to mark it as a place of honor.

The person who plants a geranium on her friend’s grave feels better for knowing that a beautiful and sturdy flower will mark the grave and keep the spirit high.

The one who lost a friend realizes that one day the geranium will meet its fate just as her friend had. A transient lot we are, for sure.

She feels gratitude for having known her friend and honors that friendship every year by tidying up the grave site and planting another geranium. If gratitude were a flower, it would mark her grave forever.

Come back next Friday for the next installment in our series of flower poems from Mrs. Sigourney’s The Voice of Flowers, “Forgotten Flowers to a Bride”.

Forest openings are great places to look for interesting plants and animals. One of the interesting plants we see in open areas is the yellow-flowering Whorled Loosestrife, Lysimachia quadrifolia.

Whorled Loosestrife seems to grow in abundance in places like the edge of woods and fields and next to trails or travel lanes with canopy openings above.

The edges of different habitats turns out to be a mixing place, a place for opportunity.

Another great place to look for activity and interesting plants is where the woodlands meet an open field. It doesn’t matter if it’s a bare field or one filled with planted crops. The point is that the forest has particular characteristics, like tall trees, lots of shade and leaf litter, that make it a different habitat than an open field.

Where two types of habitat blend into one another, you’re likely to find plants and animals that occupy both habitats. So, by looking at the edges of fields we can see some forest plants and some plants that prefer the open sky. A great place for bird watching, by the way.

Forest openings are sort of like the edge of the field. There’s more light in the open areas and that will let new plants grow there that otherwise wouldn’t grow in the deep of the forest where there is total shade.

(Photos taken 12 June 2015. Click to see a larger image!)

In whorled loosestrife the yellow star-shaped flowers have red dots around the center that are quite noticeable. Each long-stemmed flower seems to lay out over a leaf just below.

The insects near the top of the plant appear to be nymphs of some type of assassin bug. They will likely predate on caterpillars and others who might consume their plant.

Look for whorled loosestrife at the edges of woods. Plants that grow in the same areas include sassafras and blackberry.

“Spring Quickly Jumps Into Summer”

The afternoon heat and almost daily downpours complete with thunder and lightning make us think we’re in the deep of summer. The truth is that Summer is just here — by the calendar anyway.

We have different ways of measuring summer or telling when it begins. School kids will say summer starts when the last school bell rings in May or June. Old-timers might say that summer really beings with eating the first ripe homegrown tomato.

On the calendar we note that summer officially rolled in yesterday June 21 at 12:38 P.M. EDT. June 21st marked the Summer Solstice or the beginning of Astronomical Summer.

What do the seasons have to do with the stars, you ask?

So-called astronomical seasons are based on the position of the Earth in relation to the equator and the tilt of the Earth. Although the exact dates may differ from year to year, the movement of our globe is predictable.

The Summer Solstice for the Northern Hemisphere marks the time when Earth is at the most northern point from the equator. (Summertime here happens in concert with Autumn for the Southern Hemisphere, and vice versa.)

This is the way that our forefathers told the seasons – by looking up at the heavens. Early peoples would look to the heavens to determine many things, like when the best crop planting and harvesting times were to be.

Our modern calendars say that summer arrives on June 21-22, but this year it feels like summer’s been here for weeks. Thus, a different way of noting the seasons is used by most of us who don’t rely on the stars for our daily bread. And that is temperature.

Seasonal calendars, based on the annual temperature cycle, might interest people who study weather (meteorologists), climate (climatologists), and even plant flowering (us!).

In the Northern Hemisphere the warmest three months are June, July and August, and we call that quarter of the year Summer. Winter, or the coldest three months, is made up of December, January and February.

At wildeherb.com we use the following calendar to represent the seasons, adding an early, middle or late qualifier:

January – middle Winter
February – late Winter
March – early Spring
April – middle Spring
May – late Spring
June – early Summer
July – middle Summer
August – late Summer
September – early Autumn
October – middle Autumn
November – late Autumn
December – early Winter

So, when we say we’ve seen Poison Hemlock blooming in late Spring to early Summer, you’ll know that means May to June.

By the way that rotten-smelling Poison Hemlock has been blooming white in the fence rows for a couple of weeks here in Central Pennsylvania.

Welcome back to Flower Poetry Fridays with Mrs. Sigourney. Each Friday a new poem will be posted from her The Voice Of Flowers.

THE TEARS OF APRIL.

"He who goeth forth and weepeth, bearing precious seed,
shall doubtless come again with rejoicing, bringing his sheaves with him."

QUEEN of the opening year, who weep’st to take
Thy slender sceptre o’er a loyal clime,
Fearing a lot of royalty must wake
The wrinkle and the thorn before their time;

Be firm and hopeful ! for the sparkling smile
Shall kiss the transient tear-drop from thy
cheek,
And in thy foot-prints spring with gentlest wile,
The blushing primrose, and the violet meek.

The snow-drop pure shall don its mantle green,
And balmy skies awake their favoring ray,
And heralds, bright with plumage, bless the
queen,
Who joins a tender heart to regal sway.

So go thou forth, with tears, thy precious seed
Sowing in lowly trust, for Joy shall crown the
deed.

The tears of April must refer to the April showers that bring us May flowers. But who is the Queen?

The Queen is likely a “mother plant” that provides seed to be sown for the next generation with her sparkling smile.

The last line I like the best where “Joy shall crown the deed” of sowing precious seeds. It reminds us of how flowering plants have their colorful “plumage” to look forward to as the plant is growing up. And then there will be seeds anew for bringing on future smiles!

Come back next Friday for the next installment in our series of flower poems from Mrs. Sigourney’s The Voice of Flowers, “Planting Geranium and Box on the Grave of an Aged Friend”.

Welcome back to Flower Poetry Fridays with Mrs. Sigourney. Each Friday a new poem will be posted from her The Voice Of Flowers.

THE CONSTANT FRIENDS.

O SWEET soul’d flowers, with robes so bright
Fair guests of Eden birth,
In changeful characters of light,
What lines of love divine ye write
Upon this troubled earth !

Man sinn’d in Paradise, and fell —
But when the storm arose —
When thorns and brambles sow’d his path,
And gentlest natures turn’d to wrath,
Ye leagued not with his foes.

Ye sinn’d not, though to him ye clung,
When, at the guarded door,
The penal sword its terrors flung,
And warn’d him, with its flaming tongue,
To enter there no more.

Forth by his side ye meekly far’d,
With pure, reproachless eye,
And when the vengeful lion roar’d,
A balmy gush of fragrance pour’d,
In hallow’d sympathy.

Ye sprang amid the broken sod,
His weary brow to kiss ;
Bloom’d at his feet where’er he trod,
And told his burden’d heart of God,
And of a world of bliss.

Ye bow’d the head, to teach him how
He must himself decay ;
Yet, dying, charged each tiny seed
The earliest call of Spring to heed,
And cheer his future way.

From age to age, with dewy sigh,
Even from the desert glade,
Sweet words ye whisper, till ye die
Still pointing to that cloudless sky,
Where beauty cannot fade.

Constant friends in life are the flowers around us. They share their bright colors and gush their fragrances upon us teaching us about life and death, and eternal life.

It’s like Mrs. Sigourney is telling us to look toward our flowery friends for companionship and friendship. She points out that it’s like they’re right along side us experiencing life and casting smiles everywhere.

Sow your seed and make your mark. Be of cheerful heart and love one another for our time on this Earth is short!

Come back next Friday for the next installment in our series of flower poems from Mrs. Sigourney’s The Voice of Flowers, “The Tears of April”.

We found a very nice place for a trail walk near Harrisburg, PA. It’s actually located inside the loop in Mechanicsburg, called The Grandon Farms Walking Trail.

You can reach the trail by parking at the Creekview North Park Entrance and walking across the street – look both ways! – to the trail head just south of the intersection of Creekview Road and Grandon Way.

The paved trail is easy walking, unless hills or walking on slants is a problem. I call this kind of asphalt-paved trail easy as I can walk along without paying too much attention to foot work. Others might call it a moderate trail due to the inclines in places.

The wide asphalt-paved path runs through a wooded area adjacent to a small creek, called Sears Run, that runs between housing developments and eventually empties into the Conodoguinet Creek.

While we were there we saw a couple of other walkers and one guy walking his dog on the trail.

Most of the path runs through wooded areas which provided some cool relief from the hot sun. A section of the trail followed a power line right-of-way and that part of the trail was in full sun.

The trail was nicely maintained and the grass near the trail’s edge had recently been mowed. Not one single downed tree was left on the path. We saw several had been cut down or were torn down by vines and these lay in a steep gulley between the path and the creek.

It was delightful that there was no trash left behind by previous walkers.

Unfortunately, there were plenty of invasive plants like garlic mustard and especially multifora rose, which was in bloom during the last week of May.

Other more interesting plants we saw:

• stinging nettle
• wild aniseroot
• false Solomon’s seal*
• cut-leaved toothwort
• mayapple
• blackberry*
• black raspberry*

*Plants were in bloom on 25 May 2015. The others were in fruit or seed, except for the stinging nettle.

The trail has several benches along the way and some of them made from logs. An Eagle Scout project, for sure. Also, a half-dozen markers are posted to help the curious identify and learn about trees on the trail.

We did see a pair of Mallard Ducks on the creek. They flew up or down the creek when we got too close for comfort.

Surely this wooded lot is a great place to see other birds or have a peaceful lunch in a nature setting.

Welcome back to Flower Poetry Fridays with Mrs. Sigourney. Each Friday a new poem will be posted from her The Voice Of Flowers.

THE EVENING PRIMROSE.

PALE Primrose ! lingering for the evening star
   To bless thee with its beam, like some fair
         child,
Who, ere he rests on Morpheus’ downy car,
   Doth wait his mother’s blessing, pure and
         mild,
To hallow his gay dream. His red lips breathe
   The prompted prayer, fast by that parent’s
         knee,
Even as thou rear’st thy sweetly fragrant
         wreath
   To matron Evening, while she smiles on thee.

Go to thy rest, pale flower ! The star hath shed
   His benison upon thy bosom fair,
The dews of summer bathe thy pensive head,
   And weary man forgets his daily care :
Sleep on, my rose ! till morning gilds the sky,
And bright Aurora’s kiss unseals thy trembling
eye.

An ode to the Evening Primrose paints this pretty flower as one who is quite different.

As its name suggests the Evening Primrose opens her flowers at dusk or sun-down while most other flowers are closing up for the day.

The delicate yellow primrose blossoms will be wilting by noon the following day as the sun’s rays intensify.

Come back next Friday for the next installment in our series of flower poems from Mrs. Sigourney’s The Voice of Flowers, “The Constant Friends”.

Welcome back to Flower Poetry Fridays with Mrs. Sigourney. Each Friday a new poem will be posted from her The Voice Of Flowers.

THE HOLLYHOCK AND HER
VISITOR.

A LARGE bumble-bee often visited a stately
hollyhock. He lingered in the deep red cup
that she made for him, and talked busily with
her. The neighboring flowers heard the full
tones of his voice, but could not distinguish
his words.
At length, a tall larkspur bent her ear, and
listening closely, understood him to say, " I am
very rich. I have gathered much pollen. I
store it in a large wax palace, which I shall
fill with honey. None of the bumble-bees in
the village can compare with me."
" Oh, it must make you very happy," an-
swered the hollyhock, " that when any poor,
sick bees come and ask relief, you will have
plenty for them, as well as yourself."
" I cannot undertake to feed them" he re-
plied.
" Every one must provide for himself.
I worked hard to get what is mine. Let others
go and do the same."
" But will you be able to use all that you
have laid up ? And, if not, what good will it
do you ?" asked the hollyhock, blushing more
brightly from the earnestness with which
she spoke.
" I never expect to use half of it, but I do
not choose to give it away. What good will it
do me to hoard it up, do you ask ? Why, don’t
I hear people say, there goes the rich bumble
bee ? That pleases me."
" I will tell you how to get rich, too. Open
your leaves wide when the sun shines, and
gather all the beams you can, and keep them
close in your secret chamber. Then, when
the dews fall, and you have drank as much as
possible, shut yourself up, and do not let a
single drop escape on the buds below ; so you
will be sure to grow larger than they."
But the hollyhock said, " There is no avarice
among flowers. We take what our Father
sends, and are glad. We do not wrinkle our
brows with care, or grow old before our time."
The bumble-bee drew nearer still, and said,
" You know nothing at all about the pleasures
that wealth can bring. Listen ! I think of
setting up an equipage. I shall have two glow
worms for postillions ; you know their lamps
will cost me nothing. But you must not breathe
this, for I have not yet mentioned it to my
wife."
The hollyhock replied with a clear voice,
" There is neither meum nor tuum among the
flower-people. We like to share with others
the good things that come to us from above.
It makes us happier than to sound a trumpet
before us, and boast of riches with which we
do no good."
Then the large bumble-bee seemed offended
at his friend the hollyhock, and, buzzing in an
angry tone, flew away.

I do like that Mrs. Sigourney lends such endearing qualities to our flowering friends. Here, her hollyhock has little patience for the greedy bumble-bee and his penchant for obtaining more, more, more. She also shows compassion for the less fortunate and needy.

The vision of two ‘glowworms as postillions‘ made me think of the animated Alice in Wonderland. Mrs. Sigourney has a knack for creating interesting and fitting characters for her flowery friends.

Have to admit I had to look up meum and tuum, which refer to mine and thine, respectively, meaning there is no mine and yours and no ownership among the flower-people.

If we can practice an attitude of gratitude and share the bounty of blessings we receive, the world will be a better place. Be like the Hollyhock:

We take what our Father sends, and are glad.
We do not wrinkle our brows with care,
or grow old before our time.

Que Sera, Sera!

Come back next Friday for the next installment in our series of flower poems from Mrs. Sigourney’s The Voice of Flowers, “The Evening Primrose”.