Ashes From The Snow

'Fortunate gardener, who may preoccupy himself solely with beauty in these difficult and ugly days! He is one of the few people left in this distressful world to carry on the tradition of elegance and charm. A useless member of society, considered in terms of economics, he must not be denied his rightful place. He deserves to share it, however humbly, with the painter and poet....'. Vita Sackville-West

Home. Roots. The place which feeds my life energy, from the fertile dampness and warmth of mother earth: From which I was born, and to where I shall return. The great absolutes. Revolutions of life. Transient, turbulent seasons running in circles, witnessed in the pleasures and patterns of the garden! The four dimensional canvas, balancing the constant claws of nature with a refined satisfaction of order and design. Oh, the sensual rewards! The uplifting promise of life after a snow storm in late march. Budded almonds bursting forth their pink petals, announcing the end of winter's grip. June roses in rich bloom fed on the ashes from the fires burned in the hearth during cold January nights. A melancholy rustle of late August's leaves underfoot calling autumn from a slumbered memory. Patterns, shapes, texture; the form of a leaf, a bud, petal, branch: the story of time itself, held in the evolutionary records of millenia, stories of circumstance, of

struggle and survival. ​ Time, cycles, patterns. The breaths of the valley, heedless of measured time. October's dawn mist veiling the river as it curves and babbles it way towards the sea: powerful waters of the heaving Atlantic, constantly evolving the sculptural stones and cliffs. The ebbing tide tracing its ripples upon the shore, revealing a pool, a shell, a reflection upon the wet sand. The forewarning flight of crows ahead of the darkening sky. Sumptuous thickness of summer in the meadow grass, punctuated by the swift dip of a swallow; A fleeting shadow of spring against the tree trunk; Corn stalks ragged and softened in form by the late snow. Twisted trees standing in defiant evidence of the restless winds. Evanescent sunlight, brilliantly picking out the ordinary, elevating it's presence.​ Moments of sublime present.