Blue Fledglings & a Gallant Eye

Blue Fledgings & a Gallant Eye

Today the scrub jays began fledgling, hop-hop-hoping throughout the garden and I was nervous of the cat. I finally discovered him fast asleep on the corner of the bed that we made fresh this morning.

I picked up the bird and rubbed his feathers against my cheeks: so soft. I discovered from a bird-woman that its a misnomer that birds won't touch their babies if the scent of humans are on them. The olfactory sense is the dullest of them all it turns out. This one's feathers are electric they are so bright. I caressed him and he lay in the palm of my hands, looking up at me, almost as if he were saying, "Are you my mother?". I finally set him down in the quiet green and sprinkled some raw sunflower seeds at his feet. Then I went and finished watering the new columbines and chard seedlings that have come up.

This year's garden is going to be the best. But I say that every year I suspect.
I have made a barter with Bill Bruneau of Bountiful Seeds (part of John Jeavons' gardening business) to trade some of my poetry broadsides for some seeds for this year's garden. I am so glad because this has been a hard year for so many of us in Mendonesia. Bill plans to frame the poems for the office that stores the seeds and puts out the catalogue.

I plan to have Kentucky Blue Wonder Green Beans and Thai Long Beans. The Snow Peas are already in. I want the Blue Wonders to be Pole beans because I make huge tipis with three seven foot bamboo poles and as the beans grow up them, I decorate them with wild turkey feathers, shiny tinsel left over from Christmas, colored yarns with silver and gold threads in them to scare off the birds and it's beautiful as well. I also want bush beans, but we'll see what kind of room I'm talking here. Because I must have my eggplant, both Italian Globe and Japanese Long. And then there's tomatoes. There is nothing like a hot firm juicy tomato cut off the vine with grandpa's sharp pocket knife and eaten right there in the garden. And we have to have so many different kinds. Roma for making paste. which we no longer jar up, though I think we should jar some. Last year we froze it in ice cube trays and when they were frozen, we popped them out into a freezer lock bag and filled the trays over and over again. The same thing with basil, both Italian giant leaf and Thailand's stream-lined flavor packed into a thin firm leaf all smooshed up in the blender with the nuts and some kosher salt, but no garlic or cheese because they don't freeze well. When I want to make some pesto, I will defrost a cube or two and add what's needed.

There are flowers everywhere and so beautiful. Six foot foxgloves, both giant and knee-high columbines, strawberries running through the herb bed and this year we've put in red and white currants and raspberries. This is a happy spring.