autumn

Herbst

Rainer Maria Rilke

(my translation is at the bottom)

   Die Blätter fallen, fallen wie von weit,

            als welkten in den Himmeln ferne Gärten;

                                                   sie fallen mit verneinender Gebärde.

             Und in den Nächten fällt die schwere Erde

aus allen Sternen in die Einsamkeit

Wir alle fallen. Diese Hand da fällt.

                                                   Und sieh dir andre an: es ist in allen,

           Und doch ist Einer, welcher dieses Fallen

                                                   unendlich sanft in seinen Händen hält

these are Cindy’s pictures

 Autumn

Rainer Maria Rilke

                                  The leaves are falling, falling as from afar,

                                                      As though withered in the distant gardens of heaven;

                                                             They fall with a gesture of negation.

                                 And in the nights the heavy earth is falling

                           From all the stars down into loneliness.

                            We are all falling. This hand falls there.

                       And consider this: it is in everything,

                               And yet there is one, who holds this falling

        Endlessly gently in his hands.

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dead or alive?

A few years ago some well-known horticulturists visited the garden and, looking at an obviously dead plant, tried to say encouraging things about it. Like, it was dead but it might come back. When plants die, they don’t magically come back. They’re dead, and doing things like continuing to water them, even with your tears, or fertilizing them, will have no effect on them.

Aside from the prospect of having undead plants rising from the garden at midnight, which does have a certain ring to it, the truth is that no one in the world knows more about dead plants than I do. I offer an example to prove it.

This is dead. Completely, totally, utterly dead. It might look alive, but it isn’t.

dead

It’s so dead that the chances of it ever coming back are zero.

One way to tell that it’s dead (I mean, other than the fact that it’s in my garden, and that it’s dead) is to bend the little twigs. If they’re dry and snap right off, that’s a sign that the plant is dead.

Another way is to compare it with another of the same plant, purchased at the same time.

alive

Side by side, the differences are more obvious.

dead (left), alive (right)

This was a very nice extra-blue form of Juniperus monosperma that I picked up for a song at a nursery-closing sale. I planted the live one in the place in which it’s growing now, and the dead one, which was alive when I planted it, of course, in another place. Then I moved it. That place didn’t seem right so I moved it again. It was going to get too big in that spot, so I moved it again. It died almost at once.

And is still dead.

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