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Dear All,
This morning I took advantage of a lull in the relentless heat to do a little harvesting: onions and potatoes, not a great crop but given the weather conditions not bad.
There is something very satisfying in growing your own vegetables, and , there is nothing like potatoes eaten fresh from the garden. I know, I've just had some. Now I wait upon my tomatoes and runner beans. When I say mine, what have I done? I’ve planted them and tended them, made sure the earth was composted, but really it’s nature that does the real work.
In relation to the theme we've been pursuing in my class: Living in Harmony With Nature, I made contact with an old colleague of mine. She runs an organisation which is designed to bring inner city children in touch with nature, and she does that most successfully. What she does is an absolute inspiration. Here is just one response from an eleven year old: I loved just listening to the birdsong and the wind and the sound of the leaves shaking in the breeze. I enjoyed this workshop and felt very peaceful.
It’s interesting isn't it that close contact with nature creates such a great sense of harmony and peace.
Best wishes, William
The Garden of Love
In medieval poetry, the garden of love was a commonplace. It appeared over and over again in poetry.
This garden full of leaves and flowers
And craft of man’s hands so curiously
Arrayed had this garden, truly
That never was there garden of prize
But if it were the very Paradise.
The odour of the flowers and the fresh sight
Would have made any heart to light.
This is Chaucer providing a suitable setting for love, a beautiful garden in May, a beautiful time of the year – the trees in new leaf, the vitality of nature in all her vigour. Sometimes that new green attacks our senses with its vibrancy. You cannot help but be conscious of the new life surging forth after the dormancy of winter. Green is the symbolic colour of regeneration. In Christian iconography it is the colour of hope, of resurrection. The sap no longer sinks towards the earth but rises instead towards the light. No wonder the green of May reflects that light so brilliantly.
Green expresses the love of light and of life, and it is no great wonder that the greatest of all Greek sculptors, Phidias, carved a green Venus. Go into any of our great parks. See what it’s like on a sunlit afternoon in May and you will find that the medieval garden of love is not that far from our experience.
This is why people love gardening. There is something utterly essential about turning the earth, encouraging things to grow. There is a service being offered. The whole thing is dedicated to the principle of beauty. Nobody takes an uncultivated piece of land in the thought of making a garden without a desire to create something of beauty in that place. And the whole thing has its magic. To take dry seeds in the palm of your hand and then witness these pieces of dust flower and fruit is to enter into the mysterious process of creation. Those who love their gardens are intimately aware of this process. They become part of it. This is one observation:
I was in my garden planting vegetables over the weekend. It was a perfect morning for gardening. The sun was shining and yet there was a breeze to keep things cool. The soil had been well prepared. Everything was right for growing. When I had finished, I thought back on all the years that I’d done the same kind of thing. There was something about caring for that small plot of land that went beyond having fresh vegetables to eat. It was part of a deeper relationship. It was as if I had been feeding the place, and the place in turn had been feeding me. We had entered into an entirely satisfying relationship.
To find common ground with a piece of earth is indeed an entirely satisfying thing. Being fed by it involves much more than having fresh vegetables for the table. Something within is also being fed in the process.
Practice
Look at the natural world. Be aware of what is being fed by connection with that world. By opening the senses wide to what nature provides, let the heart be restored.
There is such a thing as the love of life. Why put up with a dull heart and mind when you may allow the vitality of nature to assault the senses?
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