Nature’s first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf’s a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.
~ Robert Frost
American Buckeye (Aesculus glabra) flowers with the characteristic long stamens.
It’s that time again.
Time for the most beautiful color imaginable: the golden green of spring. For me, it is the color of joy, the color of wonder.
The color of the world just waking up from a long sleep.
Looks like a squirrel silhouetted within the sun-kissed canopy, anxiously looking down at me. But it's actually a tumble of last year's dead leaves.
Of course, it’s also the color of impermanence.
If you don’t take the time out of your busy life to notice it now, before you know it you’ll have missed your chance.
That window is so brief, it astonishes me every year. Several plants didn’t make it into this post — and all because I lifted the camera to my eye a little too slowly.
One of my favorite Japanese maples at the SC Botanical Garden.
On the other hand, I took so many pictures of this Japanese maple, admiring it from every angle, that a gardener at the South Carolina Botanical Garden came over to tell me where I might buy one for my own garden.
Some things, you must make time for, no matter what.
'Yugoslavian Red Butterhead' in a pot on the back porch.
Like spring salads. Oh, they are delicious. And I have a new favorite lettuce for beauty, ‘Yugoslavian Red Butterhead.’ None of the seeds came up in late winter and fall, and I was rather disappointed. But they were only waiting until mid-January to germinate. It seems they thrive in the cold.
Once again, everything has its season.
I am so grateful that the weather held cool for as long as it did, extending our harvests. We even have a few spinach plants left, those grown in the lee of the house, protected from the midday sun. It’s delightful to have fresh spinach in April. Spinach, of course, is another one of those plants that whisper “impermanence,” at least in this climate.
Plant breeders work to hold onto that gold as long as possible, as they've done with this magnificent hosta.
Some of us just don’t want to let go when it’s time, though. Well, I certainly don’t. So I can understand the plant breeders who were determined to capture spring’s gold and bottle it up inside the tenderly veined foliage of this Hosta.
It’s not quite as poignant for me, though. Somehow the color loses its power when I know it’s going to stick around all summer. So… is that what gives this golden-green of spring its emotional punch? It’s not merely a visual sensation, but the recognition of the inexorable passage of time.
It makes me more aware than ever of how much I want to join the dance, and how grateful I am to be a part of it whenever I do, how I know that I belong here, nestled in the heart of the amazing whirl of the natural cycle.
The truth is, I am always a part of it whether I surrender to the joy of it or resist it stubbornly every step of the way. And I have done that recently, too, alternately dragging my feet and stomping them furiously. Grief has its own cycle.
I guess that’s the thing with impermanence — and with life: you get the whole deal, whether you like it or not. Joy and wonder, birth and second chances, discovery and beauty, yes. But also: heartbreak and weeping, darkness and goodbye, mortality and the bitter cold.
Today the Earth is holding out her hand, and I am ready to dance again.
Closeup of Buckeye leaves unfurling from a branch.
That is worth more to me than all the gold in existence.
Namasté, y’all.
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