Small Things And Coincidences.

often lead our minds to remember significant things, and by that, I mean things that are significant to us.  We have no garden in this new house; the garden space is under dispute, and we can't do anything with it until that is resolved.  There are no plants to admire, and I had not been aware of how much I rely on plants for inspiration.  Given that this is a new estate, there are no established gardens to enjoy, either, just a couple of cherry trees that have been planted either side of our house by the builders.  To my surprise, though, I found this leaf the other day.  I have no idea where it came from, blown in on the high winds we had last week, no doubt.

I find it beautiful.  A small thing, but it carries the memory of the plant it came from.  I'm not a gardener, so I have no idea what that might be, but it doesn't really matter.  It reminded me, though, of a poem I found while looking for something else (which is the way of these things, really).

The Vine Leaf
I know these lovely yellows and these greens,
These blues and all the moments in between;
Summer is full of them.  This, though, is the tipping point
Where green begins to turn to browns and golds, crimsons,
Aubergines, all the rich and fruitful tones of autumn. I find them
In a single leaf, a newly gifted vine, growing
Fair and unfettered in my Norfolk garden.  No grapes this year
(the plant is far too new); its tender leaves suffice
To capture this single brightly balanced moment
Between burgeoning and the slow slide into sleep.
For now it is enough, for both of us.

And when I read it, I remembered standing by that vine, admiring the colour of the leaves as they turned, taking photographs (I'm pretty sure I probably still have them somewhere), feeling that change in the weather that presages the shift to autumn.  Here's an image of the vine taken a couple of years later, in the early summer.

I'm not much of a poet, really: I'll never be published, certainly.  I don't write often enough, and I'm not terribly disciplined about it, either, as you need to be if you take it seriously, just like any other form of art.  And I've always thought of it as completely separate from the visual art...but this poem shows just how silly that is.  It is full of visual imagery.  In some ways, it is a better aide memoire than any photograph could be.  A photograph is a record of the way something looked in a particular moment; a good photograph suggests emotion.  This poem, though, contains a miniature universe of emotions, sights, smells, textures.  There's at least one textile book in there...perhaps an entire series.  All that, from a moment, a leaf and a handful of words.  Isn't that wonderful?