Welcome and Unwelcome

The prompt for my writing practice was "weeds sprout overnight." This is my effort - pictures added later.

Left to its own devices, it will carpet the soil with leafy foliage, some variegated milky green, some just green. The roots run everywhere, eventually shooting up stems that flower, broadcasting seeds far and wide to begin again.

Last summer I dug and I mulched and still this spring, there it was again, and now, the calendar turned to August, I’ve dug and pulled and still new colonies everywhere. I should just give up and let it go. 

But still, I try to resurrect some semblance of beauty from this flower bed, tucked up against the house. There’s an oak leaf hydrangea purchased at a half price sale to complement the old fashioned ones that flank the front porch, planted so many years ago by other hands. It took years for it to thrive - perhaps it was the actions of the woodchuck trying to burrow under its roots and into the foundation that kicked it into survival mode. Now it is lush and puts out lots of the blossoms that dry beautifully for fall flower arranging.

And the lilies - the orange ditch lilies and yellow stello d’oro and the deep burgundy ones that Marybeth gave me. 

There are a few lupines and orange poppies and bachelor buttons and forget me nots and random foxglove in pink and deep pink and white.

And this year, after a hiatus, there are hollyhocks. Years ago, Grandma Metzger had hollyhocks marching along that side of the house - those old fashioned flowers in pink and white and purple. They bloom only every other year, the first year putting out foliage and then the next year the tall blooms, which if left to go to seed, spread those seeds for the next year’s plants. It was with great delight that I spotted the distinctive foliage this year. I await their blooms as the summer begins to fade.

Weeds sprout overnight. In the hoop house, self-seeded calendula and marigolds and nasturtiums and dill and cilantro are almost weedlike in their habits but I cannot bear to just tear them out - opting rather to relocate to bare spots elsewhere like my flower boxes and the holes in the stumps left behind when two maple trees had to be cut. A riot of color for late summer.

Even a few sunflowers grow tall in the hoop house every year and I leave them for the birds, hoping they'll leave enough seeds behind for next year.