rev·e·la·tion – noun \ˌre-və-ˈlā-shən\ : a usually secret or surprising fact that is made known : an act of making something known : an act of revealing something in usually a surprising way : something that surprises you __________ Recently, I’ve been intrigued by birds. It started when my dad gave me two birdhouse gourds that I […] Read more
An edited reprint from the Archives . . . I began this year’s garden a couple of weeks ago. To be technical, I began the garden about six weeks ago when I started the process of removing the sticks and leaves from the raised beds and cultivating the dirt with a hoe and the tired […] Read more
For weeks I haven’t had to worry about mowing my yard or trimming the bushes or pulling weeds from the flower beds. The drought here in the Midwest has all but taken care of the yard work for the season. Even the watering became almost futile a couple of weeks back. Now I just take […] Read more
They’ve been writing sestinas all month over at Tweetspeak Poetry. Maybe you remember them from literature class. Sestinas are those 39-line poems with all the structure and form of a contract, but with the rhythm and soul of a conversation. That’s why I wrote one today, to be part of the conversation. Tweekspeak Poetry and […] Read more
I like it when things are growing in my house. Well, I don’t like all of the things that grow in my house: mold on the cheese, spiders in the corner, frost on the windows. But there are other things that grow, like house plants on the shelf or the bacteria in the compost bucket, […] Read more
When the thermometer reached up into the 60s on Friday, unseasonably warm for late December in Indiana, the last of the snow melted from my yard. Though the temperatures have sunk back below freezing, with the snow now gone, I am once again greeted each day by the leaves still lying on the ground, the […] Read more
It’s an awkward time of year for gardeners. My eggplant has reached its stride, and in addition to the two fruits that hang from its branches, there also is the promise of a couple more blooms. The basil has gone from a rather unpromising shoot that I started from seed, to a full, aromatic bush, […] Read more
The real Creeping Charlie Over the weekend, I spent about an hour stooped over flower beds, crouching into my garden, and kneeling next to fence rows pulling weeds. The recent mix of rain, sun, and heat has been the perfect combination for my zucchini and eggplant. But it’s also been perfect for the weeds. Especially […] Read more
Sweet corns shucks lay piled in a heap Just beneath the wilted greens – Chard, sorrel, kale, lettuce. Watermelon rind, shrinking, Lies among the decaying leaves and stems, Embattled, sunken hulls. Beet tops bleed out the bottom Onto pungent coffee grounds A long way from their Hawaiin home. Egg shells peek through, Birthing nothing but […] Read more
Tonight, I ate the first fruits of my garden. The leafy greens pictured above have been quietly growing in a make-shift container for the past couple of months. First, I sowed the teensy lettuce seeds in a 12-inch deep cardboard box lined with a garbage bag in my garage back in mid-February. Eventually, I moved […] Read more
