Resurrection

Experts quiped 

you would

not rise

Too old

they said

Abandoned

Pink and Rose.

No one

 imagined

 resilience,

  pattern 

  birthing

form

to vine.

Gray green

 veins

swell,

pulse,

pump

sugars 

skyward,

powered

by a

single root.

Bowed blade

circles

round to

 Beginning

 buried deep.

Spiral loosens,

ascends

seeking sun

star heat.

Two translucent

leaves appear.

 Oh, remember

who you

are!

Scarlet Runner

 Sunrise

 Passion,

Auburn Light.

In the monotonous gray glare, spring feels like a dream. It is a challenge to stay present to now without succumbing to something akin to despair. Another round of raging northeasters… Will this winter ever end?

 But I have help. Mourning doves are cooing all day long, turkeys are gobbling, and flocks of chickadees and cardinals gather at the window for seeds.

And now I am witness to the birth of a scarlet runner bean.

Ten days ago I threw an old mauve and rose bean seed in a packet of liverworts that I was taking to my friend‘s lab to view under a microscope.

The seed was an old one that I had used for a number of years in winter bouguets. I still have no idea why I added the seed. After a year or two scarlet runners are no longer viable (according to experts). Imagine my astonishment when I opened the packet and discovered the seed had germinated! My friend, an experimental scientist and I peered at the root microscopically; I was astounded to see hundreds of rootlets waiting to penetrate soil that will eventually allow them to join a mycelial network.

When I reached home I planted the sturdy white root in poor compacted soil, the only untreated medium I had access to during the winter.

Three days ago I noted the bulging surface. The seed was struggling to break hard ground. One day later the seed case was visible as was a grayish veining leaflet that curled in on itself in a tight spiral as if saying goodbye to its root. 

After a trip to a greenhouse for organic (non – miracle grow) medium the next day I amended the soil on the surface, raking some in with a fork but left the root untouched.

Within 24 hours I had a bean plant. During this period I photographed the changes that occurred within hours – just obsessed by the process – and just as if I hadn’t been planting  seeds all my life! The naturalist in me obviously retains a child of wonder.

Yesterday’s poem was a tribute to my charged relationship with this particular bean plant. It wasn’t until I finished the writing that It became clear that the boundaries between the seed and myself had blurred. 

I have been a gardener all my life and had only recently given up growing scarlet runners because the abundance of deer ravaged both vines and flowers. Fenced in gardens create such artifical man made boundaries…so I adapted, believingmy life with scarlet runners had come to an end. 

(my garden full of scarlet runners before the deer destruction)

Well, not quite. I promised this bean that s/he would find home here and be left to grow into maturity safely. How I will acomplish this? Fencing. I‘ll transplant the bean next my  protected guardian cedar!