The aggressively pruned magnolia beneath my window reminded me of my heart when I first moved here. She looked so barren and stumpy and I wondered if she might ever recover. As the years passed she, like I, grew back again, getting stronger with every spring, even glowing with gold in the autumn sun when she faced the impending gloom of winter.
This year she never seemed so magnificent. She gave me bold white flowers to make syrup from in March and by June her arms were flung wide open, her palms outstretched dripping drapes of green satin, the space beneath her leaves a cool cocoon for clandestine lovers on a midsummer’s eve. That night she was our oyster shell iridiscent with the pearl of our first kiss. And that night it was she who watched me, thinking how golden, how gorgeous, how nourishing the power of a lover’s gaze can truly be.
Beautiful
As usual so evocative. Beautiful pictures of transition. The magnolia is truly one of the Queens of plants.