Archive for August 2019
Small, small garden
Arthritis means my days of the big garden are over. But I can still enjoy digging in the earth, planting seeds, pulling weeds and harvesting, just on a smaller scale.
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On our deck are two Veg Trugs (Lee Valley Tools used to sell them) and one bag of soil, slit open and supported on a metal frame. In the ‘gardens’ I have two snow pea plants, three yellow wax bean plants, three parsley plants and one cucumber plant.
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Each day for the last month, I sit on the deck and nibble on my ‘harvest for the day.’ Sometimes it’s one bean pod and a snow pea pod, sometimes two beans, sometimes a cucumber sandwich. Seems small, but I think I enjoy these little sessions more than the buckets of produce I once harvested from my garden.
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Tea berries
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Teaberry
Gaultheria procumbens
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leaves shiny, thick
capsules waxy, red
aromatic oil
methyl salicylate
mint and wintergreen
tea soothing, blood thinning
creeping wintergreen
spice berry, drunkards
staggering over
the forest floor
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Copyright Jane Tims 2019
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All my best
Jane
Raspberries
It’s a great year for berries. Our blueberry bushes are loaded with the biggest, sweetest berries I have ever tasted. The raspberries are full and sweet. The blackberries are still mostly unripe but the canes are heavy with future berries.
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raspberry ramble
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every berry
a sweet cup
detached
from its cosy seat
deep in brambles
juice pressed
between teeth
seeds and briars
handfuls of sun
rain clouds
warm winds
gravel soil
eager fingers
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Copyright Jane Tims 2019
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All my best
Jane
moose
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moose
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square body
four hundred kilos
cow lifts her head, angular
stares at the car
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long ears maneuvre
in all directions
no challenge
dewlap swings
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cow returns to her business
prehensile lips
pulling leaves
and chokecherries
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We saw this moose on the way to our cabin, about a kilometre along the road. She stared at us for a while, eyes and ears curious, but eventually she returned to her feeding.
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All the berries are coming into ripe: chokecherries, blueberries and blackberries. At the cabin the blueberries are the largest and sweetest I have ever seen. Everywhere I picked showed evidence of an animal there before me. Not a moose. Perhaps a bear, not caring where he sat as long as he could scoop up those berries.
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All my best, Jane
Copyright August 2019
blackberries
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blackberries
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floricanes bend
with August weight
shape an archway
show the path
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through brambles
to lake
pergola unfastens
gate, entices
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pickers
into wicked thorns
sweet indigo
temptation
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primocanes snag
hems of gloves
ankles of socks
handles of baskets
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angry scratch
for every berry
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Copyright Jane Tims 2019
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Hope you are enjoying this blackberry summer.
All my best,
Jane
root cellar
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root cellar
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over the hill
cold earth sequesters
seeps of water
and lichened stone
roots in dry sand
preserves on shelves
of rough-hewn boards
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mice gnaw on the seam
of a gunny sack of corn
blue mold on the surface
of a jar of apple jelly
Mama just scoops it away
pumpkins never keep
past December
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Copyright Jane Tims 2019
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All my best,
Jane
dandelion fluff
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dandelion fluff
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purse lips
and puff
make a wish
scatter seeds
to wind
and follow
into sun
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Copyright Jane Tims 2019
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All my best,
Jane
Pearly everlasting
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Pearly Everlasting
Anaphalis margaritacea L.
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Pearly Everlasting
sign of summer’s passing
yet – immortelle
picked by the road
by the armload
hung from rafters
children’s laughter
runs beneath
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downy leaf, woolly stem
white diadem
perfectly matched flowers
thatched in gold
dry and old
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Linnaeus named
for Marguarite
memory sweet
paper petals keep
pale perfume
summer grace
in a winter room
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Published as: ‘Pearly Everlasting’, The Antingonish Review 92, 1993 and at niche poetry and prose, August 20, 2012 here
Copyright Jane Tims 2012
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All my best,
Jane
in an orchard
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orchard
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between apples, twigs and leaves
stems and branches
are glimpses
of sky
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sapphire and cerulean
panes of leaded
transparent
glass
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molten in motions of wind
edges in
malleable
light
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fragile as blades of bent grass
stiffened by frozen
morning
dew
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Copyright 2019 Jane Tims
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All my best,
Jane
fetching water
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fetching water
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‘Strength in those arms,’
says Mama. ‘Fetch
me a bucket
of cold water
from the well.’
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‘Need one of those
pumps,’ says Papa.
‘Painted iron,
hornbeam handle.’
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‘No need,’ says Thomas.
‘I know how to drop
the bucket
so she fills
the first time.
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‘Echoes lift
from well-stones.
My face down there,
winks on the water.
Strength in these arms.’
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Copyright 2019 Jane Tims
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All my best,
Jane
nichepoetryandprose 