The year 2020 comes to a close. One thinks, in hindsight, this was one best skipped, until one pauses and realizes life, all life, including blooming plants, has continued as usual. Our human lives in civilization shall, too, and may even return to some kind of normal, maybe even this next new year.
Farewell, 2020 . . . Here’s to 2021!
— rPs 12 31 2020
I looked down for inspiration in October. I looked up and found it, again, in November.
The fall season progresses, and as the tree’s leaves thin out, the colors of those that remain on the branches appear even more vivid due to the open space, the contrasting blue, or white, or gray sky above.
Years ago, as a new Romantic poet in his senior year at university, I was first struck by this perceived increased intensity of the foliage as the season aged. I had a daily walk up a hilly avenue lined by mature trees to reach my morning classes, and on one sunny day I looked up, and a poem appeared fully formed:
My Perfect Autumn Day
Blue and gold days
Have come to call.
Gilded trees, warm,
And clear, cool air;
I stare, this morning,
At a mighty mosaic.
We call this fall,
My perfect autumn day;
I say, each leaf is a coin,
Pure gold for my pocket.
If this season were a vault,
I would lock it,
And save them forever.
The poem retains the memory, the treasure, of that day. The same can be done with words now, added and aided by the convenience of the smartphone camera.
Looking up, one can see the gold of the birch, gingko, locust, and Norway maple against a bluebird sky. The white cloud of a rainy day allows the same yellows to glow in place of the sun.
The blue above also enhances the reds of the oak, and the full spectrum of the sweetgum, known also as liquidamber, and the savory tans of the London plane tree, whose overhead spread can resemble a cathdral when planted in rows . . .
. . . . Which reminds me of a stanza from another poem composed on another autumn walk:
The tall plane trees sigh.
A broken spot of blue
In the gray and white sky
Grows as it goes by.
The fall is a wonderful time to spend time outside. Inspiration can be found, or recalled. The truth of a little poem, written so long ago, may very well be that each and every one is a perfect autumn day.
— rPs 11 30 2020
August Harvest . . .
A summer salad of Asiatic dayflower, Galinsoga, and Lady’s Thumb.
(NYC 08 31 2020)
Family and friends have begun to share photos, and salads, from their gardens as the month of August comes to a close. The wild patches of Manhattan’s west side have also reached their peak of productivity.
A morning walk, or a stroll to watch the evening sun set behind the Hudson, will also be accompanied by a diverse harvest of native and immigrant wildflowers in full bloom and fruit. This salad bar of sorts includes:
American Pokeweed, Phytolacca americana
(NYC 08 17 2020)
Bittersweet Nightshade, Solanum dulcamara
(NYC 08 31 2020)
Broadleaf Plantain, Plantago major
(NYC 08 31 2020)
Butter and Eggs, Linaria vulgaris
(08 08 2020)
Chicory, Cichorium intybus
(NYC 08 2020)
Common Black Nightshade, Solanum nigrum
(NYC 08 17 2020)
Common Mallow, Malva neglecta
(NYC 08 17 2020)
Galinsoga, Galinsoga parviflora
(NYC 08 17 2020)
Lady’s Thumb, Persicaria maculosa
(NYC 08 17 2020)
Marestail, Conyza canadensis
(NYC 08 31 2020)
There is quite a selection to see. August’s harvest is here.
— rPs 08 31 2020
May Flowers of Manhattan . . .
Yellow Flag
(NYC 05 2020)
City wildflowers have never lifted my spirits more than during this month of May. Morning walks home from my essential worksite have cleansed my mind, filled my lungs with fresh air, and filled my eyes with life worth living. Views in bloom I hope will be the main lasting memory I keep of this chequered pandemic time.
Here are a few thousand words worth of photos to convey the magnificence of this May in Manhattan:
Wild Columbine
Wild Columbine, Aquilegia canadensis
(NYC 05 2020)
Shepherd’s Purse
Shepherd’s Purse, Capsella bursa-pastoris
(NYC 05 2020)
English Plantain
English Plantain, Plantago lanceolata
(NYC 05 31 2020)
And last, and perhaps most iconic: the always cheerful Common Dandelion
Common Dandelion, Taraxacum officinale
(NYC 05 31 2020)
All the above and more can be seen now during a walk through the city’s many green spaces. Grab a mask, and go . . .
The Green Path
(NYC 05 2020)
— rPs 05 31 2020
Reason for Hope . . .
First Snopdrop Sighting:
Galanthus nivalis
(NYC 01 31 2020)
January is either a damp cold colored brown, white, and gray during a walk outside, or the sky above is a transluscent blue lens magnifying sun and wind into a bright frigid bluster.
Life greets first losses of the year especially hard. Hard to lose a personal hero, Neil Peart, who was quite clear and correct in the title track from the Rush LP Presto: “I radiate more heat than light.”
Peart was an avid cyclist and birder in between life as a recording artist and author. He inspired (the “heat” to create). Role models as such it follows I am an avid cyclist and documentarian of urban flora, indiginous and immigrant, in between life as an author.
Sad, too, to lose one who makes us laugh (Monty Python’s Terry Jones) and who’s sheer elevation of life lifts us (NBA and Oscar winner, Kobe Bryant).
Saying goodbye, letting go, tasks in life always never easy. The reason for hope in all that can be found; it emerges like a snowdrop from the remnants of last year’s leaf fall. The first flower of the year near month’s end is like a lawn bathed in January sun. Bright and alive, the thaw, temporary perhaps, but a reminder new life follows from the former; everything continues.
Winter Season Variety:
Groundsel, Senecio vulgaris, and others.
(01 2020)
Bloomsday 2019 . . .
Trifolium pratense
Bloomsday on a Father’s Day Sunday, 2019 celebrates quite a packed, stacked, and weighty day for the wildflowers situated in sutu within a peak perlod of . . . bloom:
Chicorium
Chicory
(NYC 06 2019)
Malva
Mallow
(NYC 06 2019)
Brassica
Wild Mustard
(NYC 06 2019)
Solanum
Bittersweet Nightshade
(NYC 06 2019)
Circium
Canada Thistle
(NYC 06 2019)
ReJoyce and Enjoy!
(NYC 06 16 2019)
— rPs 06 16 2019
Postscript: Read WWV’s original Joycean odyssey here:
https://wildflowersofthewestvillage.com/2010/06/16/bloomsday/
Path and Pond . . .
Tulip Tree Flower
(NYC 05 2019)
Spring season stalwarts of the wildflower world are in full bloom throughoit the city as the month of May comes to a close.
Two of the most iconic can be found along two distinct spots: the shaded path and the sunny pond.
The park trail may well be lined by the subtle reds of the bushy wild red columbine, Aquilegia canadensis.
Aquilegia canadensis
(NYC 05 2019)
By the water, the full sun fuels the rich nectar of the wild iris Henry David Thoreau called the yellow flag, Iris pseudacorus.
Iris pseudacorus
(NYC 05 2019)
These are just two of the many wildflowers to be found flowering in the West Village and the rest of Manhattan during these salad days of spring. These living still lifes in situ make a great excuse for a walk in NYC’s park(s).
— rPs 05 31 2019
May Day 2019 . . .
Lush Lawn Still Life: Taraxicum officinale
(NYC 05 2019)
Today, the first day of the fifth month, a century to the day after the Cleveland socialist riots, the set date of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s epic novella May Day.
“May Day!” — def: distress signal
Here. Now. Happiness. Everything green seems to be in bloom in the West Village along the verdant basalt bluffs of the Hudson River.
Winged Liberty “Mercury” dime minted in 1919.
Once in the pocket of F. Scott Fitzgerald?
(NYC 05 2019)
— rPs 05 01 2019
Postscript: Link to an online copy of “May Day” by F. Scott Fitzgerald:
https://en.m.wikisource.org/wiki/May_Day_(Fitzgerald)/Chapter_I?fbclid=IwAR35fVS-XMY_htrkXtSPFV7YkhvRi5zvnkVG6_2NhO8uOyHRK-8Ezu5X8nw
Halloween Color . . .
Halloween Foliage: Somewhere in New York
(10 30 2018)
Perhaps the most iconic Halloween image is the bright orange pumpkin. Leaves of the sugar maple have a similar shade, and the wildflowers of the late autumn, if not ghost white, are a shade of yellow, gold, or Halloween orange.
Northern Bush-honeysuckle:
Diervilla lonicera
(NY 10 30 2018)
— rps 10 31 2018
Flores de Mayo . . .
Viola sororia
(NYC 05 06 2018)
Instant summer temperatures in the center heart of the spring season have made Manhattan bloom at the start of May.
Just a few days of sun and shower have combined to turn the blue, white, and brown tones of the cold season into a multicolored outdoor scene anchored in green:
Dandelion
Taraxicum officinale
(NYC 05 06 2018)
Dead-nettle
Lamium purpureum
(NYC 05 06 2018)
English Plaintain
Plantago lanceolata
(NYC 05 06 2018)
Garlic Mustard
Alliarim petiolata
(NYC 05 06 2018)
And one for the late Gary Lincoff, mycologist, guide, and author, who left us in Manhattan on March 16th:
Order Agaricales: for Gary
(NYC 05 05 2018)
Memories remain as May flowers on the West Side of Manhattan.
— rPs 05 06 2018
Wildflowers of the West Village 